l±l£lj 



THREE IMPOSTORS. 



TRANSLATED 



(WITH NOTES AND ILLUSTRATiONS, ) 



FROM THE FRENCH EDITION OF THE WORK, PUBLISHED 
AT AMSTERDAM, 1776. 




REPUBLISHED BY 

G. VALE, *' BEACON " OFFICE, 3 FRANKLIK-SQUARF, 

NEW-YORK : 
1846. 



^ 






t^ 



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NOTE BY THE AMERICAN PUBLISHER.. 



We publish this valuable work, for the reasons contained 
in the following Note, of which we approve : — 



NOTE BY THE BRITISH PUBLISHER. 

The following litttle book I present to the reader without 
any remarks on the different opinions relative to its antiquity ; 
as the subject is amply discussed in the body of the work, 
and constitutes one of its most interesting and attractive fea- 
tures. The Edition from which the present is translated 
w^as brought me from Paris by a distinguished defender of 
Civil and Religious Liberty : and as my friend had an anxiety 
from a thorough conviction of its interest and value, to see it 
published in the English Language, I have from like feelings 
brought it before the public ; and I am convinced that it is 
an excellent antidote to Superstition and Intolerance, and 
eminently calculated to promote the cause of Freedom, Jus- 
lice, and Morality. 

I. MYLES. 



PREFACE BY THE TRANSLATOR. 



The Translator of the following little treatise deems it ne- 
cessary to say a few words as to the object of its publication. 
It is given to the world, neither with a view to advocate 
Scepticism, nor to spread infidelity, but simply to vindicate 
the right of private judgment. No human being is in a po- 
sition to look into the heart, or to decide correctly as to the 
creed or conduct of his fellow mortals j and the attributes of 
the Deity are so far beyond the grasp of limited reason, that 
U)an must become a God himself before he can comprehend 
them. Such being the case, surely all harsh censure of 
each other's opinions and actions ought to be abandoned ; and 
qvery one should so train himself as to be enabled to declare 
\^'ith the humane and manly philosopher 

*' Homo sum, nihil hiimania,uie allfiunai pulo." 
Dundee, September 1814, 



CONTENTS OF THE PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. 



DISQUISITIONS on the book entitled *' The Three Impostoks." 

ANSWER to the dissertation of M. de la Monnoye on the work ei^ 
titled '' The These Impostors." 

copy of Part 2d, Vol. 1., Article ix. of *' Literary Memoirs," pub- 
lished at the Hague by Henry du Sauzet, 171G. 



ON THE BOOK ENTITLED 



It has long been a disputed point if there was at any time a^ 
book printed and bearing the title of " The Three Impos- 
tors." 

M. de la Monnoye, having been informed that a learned 
Germani intended to publish a disertation the object of which 
was to prove that this work had really been printed, wrote 
a letter, in refutation, to one of his friends ; this letter was 
given by M. Bayle to M. Basnage de Bauval, who in Feb- 2/ 
ruary 1694, gave an extract from it in his " History of the 
works of celebrated and learned men." At a later period 
M. de la Monnoye entered more fully into the subject, in a 
letter dated at Paris 16th of June, 1712, and addressed to 
President Bouhier, in which letter, he says, will be found 
an abridged but complete account of this remarkable book. 

He condemns at once the opinion of those who attribute 
the work to the Emperor Frederick. The false charge, he 
says, took its rise from a passage in the appendix to a dis- 
course concerning Antichrist, and published by Grotius,. 
wherein he speaks .as follows2 : Far be it from me to attri- 

1 Daniel George Mor.of, who died suddenly on the 30th of June 1691. 

2 Libruoi de tribu3 impostoribus absit ut Papce tribuam, aut Papse 
oppugnatoribus ; jam dim inimici Frederici BarbarossaB Iiuperatoris 
famam sparserant libri talis, quasi jussu ipsius scripti, sed ab eo tem- 
pore, nemo est qui viderit; quare fabulam esse arbitror. 



8 

bute the book called ' The Three Impostors,' either to the 
Pope, or to the opponents of the Pope ; long ago the ene- 
mies of the Emperor Frederick Barbarussa set abroad the 
report of such a book, as having been written by his com* 
mand ; but from that period nobody has seen it ; for which 
reason I consider it apocryphal." 

Colomiez quotes this, page 28 of his '^ Historical Miscel- 
lanies f but he adds that there are some blunders — that it 
was not Frederick I. (Barbarossa,) on whom they intended 
to fix the authorship, but Frederick II. his grandson. This 
he says, is apparent from the letters of Pierre des Vignes, 
the secretary and chancellor of the second Frederick, and 
from Matthew Paris ; inasmuch as. they record, that this 
monarch was blamed for having said that the world had been 
led aside by " Three Impostors ;" but by no means that he 
had written a book having such a title. The Emperor de- 
nied in, the strongest terms, that he ever made u^e of any 
expression to that effect. He detested the blasphemy with 
which they charged him, and declared that it was an atro- 
cious calumny; more shame to Lipsiiis and other writers 
who have condemned him without sufficiently looking into 
the evidences. 

Averroes, nearly a century previous, had jeered at the 
three religions, saying^ ; that "the Jewish religion was a 
law for children ; the Christian religion a law which it was 
impossible to follow ; and the Mah.ometan religion a. law in 
favor of swine."4 

Since then, many people have written with great free- 
dom on this, same subject. 

We read in the works of Thomas de Catimpre, that M. 
Simon de Tournay had said that "Three Seducers" — Moses 
Jesus Christ, and Mahomet, had "mystified mankind with 
their doctrines." This is evidently the M. Simon de Chur- 
nay, of whom Matthew Paris relates some other improprie- 
ties, and the same individual w^hom Polydore Virgil styles 
de Turwai, the orthography in both instances having been 
mismanaged. 

3 Apud Nevizanum 1. Sylvae nupl. 2. n. 121. 
4 Doubtless Averroes here alludes to that law of Mahomet which 
wisely prohibits the use of pork io a hot and pestilential climate. — 
Translator's Note, 



Amongst the manuscripts of the Abbe Colbert's library, 
obtained possession of by our sovereign in 1732, there is 
one numbered 2071, written by Alvaro Pelagius, a Spaniard 
of the Cordelian ord^r, bishop of Salves and Algarve, and 
well known on account of his work, "The Lamentation of 
^he Ohurch." He states that an individual named Scotus, 
of the same order as himself and a Jacobin, was at that time 
a prisoner at Lisbon on a charge of blasphemy. Scotus, 
it would appear, had said that he considered Moses, Jesus 
Christ and Mahomet as " Three impostors ;" for that, the 
iirst had deceived the Jews ; the second the Christians ; and 
the third the Saracens.5 

Gabriel Barlette, in his sermon upon St. Andrew, alludes 
to Porphyry in this way ; *'and therefore the notion of Por- 
phyry is absurd, when he says that th^re had existed three 
individuals who had ttirned over the world to their own 
opinions ; the first being Moses amongst the Jewish people 
— the second Mahomet, and the third Christ."6 A strange 
chronologist to stamp the era of Christ and Porphyry after 
that of Mahomet ! 

The Maiiuscripts of the Vatican, quoted by Odomir Rai- 
noldo in the nineteenth volume of his Ecclesiastical Annals, 
mention one Jeannin de Solcia, a canon at Bergame, a doc- 
tor of civil and canon law, known from a decree of Pope 
Pius II., as Javinus de Solcia. He was condemned on the 
14th November 1459 for having maintaine<^ this impiety — 
that xMoses, Jesus Christ, and Mahomet had ruled the world 
at their pleasure. Mundum pro suarem libito voluntalum 
rexisse.'* 

John Louis Vivaldo de Mondovi,\vho wrote in 1506, and 
amongst whose works there is a treatise on '' The Twelve 
persecutions of the Church of God," says, in his chapter 
upon the sixth persecution, that there were people who dared 

-5 Disseminavit iste inipius haereticus in Hispania, [such is the lan- 
guage made use of by Alvaro Pelagius], quod trcs deceptores fuerunt 
in mundo, Bcilicet, Moises, qui decepterat Judaeos, et Christus, qui 
decepterat Christianos, et Mahometus, qui decepit Sarrazenoa. 

6 Etsic falsa est Porphirii sententia, qui dixit trcs fuisse garrulaloies 
qui totum niunduai ad se converterunt ; primus fuit Moisea in populo 
Judaico, secundua Mahometus, tertius Christus. 



^ 10 

to disputp, which of the three law-givers had been most fol- 
lowed, Jesus Christ, Moses, or Mahomet/ 

Herman Ristwyk, a Dutchman, burned at the Hague in 
1512, sneered at the Jewish and Christian religions. He 
does not speak of the Mahometan creed ; but a man who 
could regard Moses and Jesus Christ as impostors, could 
entertain no better opinion of Mahomet. 

Now w^e must turn to an author, name unknown, but ac- 
cused of blasphemy against Jesus Christ. The charge was 
founded upon some papers discovered at Geneva in 1547, 
amongst the documents belonging to M. Gruet. An Italian, 
nam.ed Fausto da Longiano, had begun a work which he 
entitled " The Temple of Truth,'^ in which he undertakes 
no less than to overturn all religions. '' I have," he says, 
** begun another work entitled 'The Temple of Truth.' It 
is probable that I may divide it into thirty books. In this 
work will be found the extinction of all sects — Jews, Chris- 
tian, Mahometan, and other superstitions ; and matters will 
be brought back to their first principles." 

Now, amongst the letters of Aretino addresssed to Fausto, 
there is not one to be met with which alludes in any way 
whatever to this work. Perhaps it had never been w^-itten, 
and although it had been published, it must have been a very 
different book from the one in question ; of which, they 
pretend that there are some copies in the libraries in Ger- 
many, printed in folio, and written in High Dutch. 

Claude Beauregard, better known under his Latin appel- 
lation Berigardus, a professor of philosophy, first at Paris, 
next at Pisa, and latterly at Padua, quotes or forges a pas- 
sage from the work, ''The Three Impostors," in which the 
miracles which Moses performed in Egypt are attributed to 
the superiority of his dejnon^ over that of the Magicians of 

7 Qui in quaestionem vertere presumunt, dicentes ; quisin h^c niurr 
do majorem gentium ant populoriim sequelam habuit, an Christns, an 
Moises, an Mahometus ? 

8 Every classical scholar must have heard of the demon of Socrates. 
The belief iu the existence of such agencies was sufficiently prevalent 
in the East 2000 years ago, and the Jews were in this respect, as cre- 
dulous as their neighbors. We read in Acts, c. iv. v. 7, that the lead- 
ers of the Sanhedrim enquired of the Apostle Peter, '* By what power^ 



11 

Pharoah. Giordano Bruno who was burned at Rome, 17th 
Feb, 1600, was accused of havmg advanced something much 
to the same effect. But ahhough Beaitre:gard and Bruno 
have indulged in such reveries, and have thought proper to 
assert that they quoted from the work in question, is this a 
<3ertain proof that th«y had read the book ? If so 
they w^oiild doubtless have stated whether it was in manu- 
script, or in print, and referred to the size and the place 
where they found it. 

Tentzelius, trusting to one of his friends, a pretended 
ocular witness, gives a description of the book, and specifies 
the number of leaves and sheets ; and attempting to prove 
in chap. III. of his work that the ambition of legislators is 
the only source of all religions, he gives as examples 
Moses, Jesus Christ, and Mahomet. Sturvius, after Tent- 
zelius, enters into the same subject, but finding nothing but 
what a clever fabulist might invent, he seems much inclined 
to disbelieve in the existence of the book. 

A journalist at Leipsic, in his " acta cruditarum^^' dated 
Jan. 1709, pp. 36 and 37, gives the following extract from 
a letter addressed to him : "Having occasion to be in Saxony 
I saw, in the Library of M . . ., a book entitled '* The Three 
Impostors." It is an 8vo volume, in Latin, without the name 
of the printer or the date of its publication ; but to judge from 
the letter it appears to have been published in Germany. It 
was to no purpose that 1 tri-ed to obtain permission to read 
the whole work. Th-e proprietor of the book, a man of sen- 
sitive piety, would not consent to it. I have since learned 
that a celebrated professor at Stuttgard had offered a great 
sum of money for the volume. Shortly afterwards I went 
to Nuremberg, and in talking of this work to M.Andre Mylh- 
dorf, a man respectable alike for his age, and from his 
learning, he assured me he had read it, and that M. Wolfer 
a clergyman had lent it to him. From the manner in which 
he spoke, I thought it might be a copy of the one alluded 

or 6t/ \chat name, have ye done this ;" evidently acknowledging their 
belief that it was possible to work miracles by the invocation of some 
mysterious power. The Apostle, himself a Jew, seems to understand 
their creed ; but he answers them in a way for which they were not 
altogether prepared — Translator's Note, 



12 

to above, and I concluded that it was unquestionably th^ 
book referred to ; but not that it was in octavo, nor of so old 
a date, nor perhaps so accurate/' The writer of the fore- 
going was able to throw more light upon the subject and 
ought to have done so ; for it is not enough to say that he 
had seen the book — he must produce evidence that he had 
seen it, otherwise he ought to be classed with those who 
promulgate opinions founded on mere report ; in which ca- 
tegory we must include all the authors to whom reference 
is made in this disquisition. 

The first who makes mention of the book as it existed in 
1543, is William Postel, in his treatise on the agreement 
of the Alcoran with the doctrines of the Lutherans or the 
Evangelists. He calls the work ^'Anevangelistes,^^ and at- 
tempts in it to bring the Lutheran doctrines into utter disre- 
pute by proving that they lead straightway to Atheism. To 
support his argument he instances three or four productions 
written, as he says, by Atheists, whom he declares to have 
been the first disciples of this new Gospel. He adds, " my 
opinion can be vindicated by reference to an infamous pam- 
phlet written by Yillanovanus relative to three works res- 
pectively entitled * The Cymbal of the World,' * Pantagruel,* 
and the ' New Islands ;' the authors of which works were 
the standard-bearers of the Atheistical party." 

This Yillanovanus, whom Postel asserts to be the author 
of the book '' The Three Imposters," was Michel Servetus 
the son of a notary, born in 1509, at Villanueva in Aragon, 
who assumed the name of Yillanovanus, in a preface to a 
Bible which was printed for him at Lyons, 1542, by Hugues 
de la Porte. In France his designation was Yilleneuve, 
under which title he was impeached, after he had publish- 
ed at Yienna, in Dauphiny, 1553, (the year before his death) 
the work entituled '' Christianity restored ;" a book extreme- 
ly rare, on account of the trouble which they took at Gene- 
va to find out the copies of the work and get them burned. 
In the authentic list of the writings of Servetus, however, 
we do not find mention made of *' The Three Impostors.'' 
Neither Calvin nor Beza, nor Alexander Morus, nor any 
other defender of the Huguenot party who wrote against 
Servetus, and whose interest it was to justify his punish- 
ment, and to convict him of having written this w^ork, has 



laid it to bis charge. Fostel, an ex- Jesuit, was the first io 
do so, without grounds. 

Florimoiid de Remond, a councillor in the Senate at Bor- 
df^aux, writes decidedly that he had seen this book in print. 
His words are ; "James Curio, in his Chronology 1556, as- 
serls that the Palatinate was filled with scoffers at religion,- 
the Lievanistes, viz, a sect who considered the Sacred 
Writings as fabulous, and more especially tho&e of Moses, 
the great Lawgiver of God. Is there not a book, ' ThQ 
Three Impo-surrs,' defaming the three religioiis which alone 
acknowledge the Iriie God — the Jewish, the C^hristian, and 
the Mahometan ? — a book composed in Germany, but printed, 
elsewhere at the exact moment when these heretics are em- 
ploying this individual to spread abroad their doctrines? 
The very title shows the character of the age which has dar- 
ed to publish so impious a treatise. I would have referred 
to it unless Csius and Genehrard had spoken to me on the 
subject. I recollect that in my earlier days I saw a copy 
of this work at the College of Presle. It belonged to Ramus, 
a man distinguished for his extraordinary learning, and who 
was then employed in deep researches into the mysteries 
connected with religious belief; which subject he intended 
to treat in a philosophical marmer. At this time they were 
circulating this iniquitous work amongst the learned, who 
were very desirous to see it." A curious inquirer into 
secrets ! 

Everybody knows Florirnond de Remond as an insignifi- 
cant scrilibler. There are three remarkable sayings in cur- 
rency against him ; that "he built without money, that he 
w as a judge without principle, and an author without know- 
ledge. 9^' We know also that he always lent his name to 
P. Kicheaume, a Jesuite much hated by the Protestants, 
who cloaked his own name by assuming that of the council- 
lor of Bordeaux. Now, if Osius and Genehrard had spoken 
as decidedly as Florirnond de Remond, there might have 
been somewhat to rest upon ; but see what Genehrard says 
in the thirty-ninth page of his answer to Lambert Danan, 

9 ^ideficabat sine pecunia, judicabat sine conscientla, scribebat sitx) 
scientia. 



14 

printed (octavo) at Paris 1581.10 " They (his own party) 
have not driven BJandratus, nor Alciatus, nor Ochiniis into 
Mahometanism ; nor have they induced Valleus to profess 
himself an Atheist ; neither have they enticed any one 
whatever to circulate the work called "The Three Impos- 
tors," wherein Christ the Lord is alluded to as the second, 
the other two being Moses and Mahomet." 

Is that the way to identifiy this impious book ? and Gen- 
ebrard, forsooth had seen it! And can it be, that in the pre- 
sent day people will attempt lo get up regular proof to show 
that such a work exists ? It is a well known fact that, in 
all ages, many lies have been palmed off in reference to 
books which could never be discovered, although individu- 
als declare that they had seen them and even went so far 
as to mention the places where they had been favoured with 
their perusal. 

It has been said that this work was in the library of M. 
Salvius, the Swedish ambassador, at Munster, and that 
Queen Christiana, unwilling to ask it of him while he lived, 
immediately sent M. Bourdelet, her chief physician, to en- 
treat his widow to satisfy her curiosity, when he vi^as in- 
formed that M. Salvius, having been siezed with remorse 
of conscience on the night of his death, made them burn the 
work in his presence. A short time afterwards Christiana 
enquired eagerly after the " Colloquium Heptaphlomers''^ by 
Bodin, a manuscript, at that period extremely rare ; after a 
long search it was found, but whatever desire the Queen 
had to see the work in question, and although it was sought 
after in all the libraries of Europe, she died without having 
discovered it. Ought we not therefore to conclude that it 
was never in existence ? Without doubt the pains taken 
by Christina would have led to the discovery of that book 
which Postel declares was printed in 1543, and which Flor- 
imond de Remond says appeared in 1556. Since then 
different individuals have assigned to it other dates. 

10 Non Blandratum, noii Alciatum, non Ochinum ad Mahometism- 
um impuleruDt; nonValleum ad atheismi professionem induxerunt» 
non alium quemdam ad spargendumlibellum de tribus impostoribusj 
quorum secundus esset Christus Dominus, duo alii Moisesel Maho- 
metes, pellexerunt. 



15 

In 1654, Jean Baptiste Morin, a celebrated doctor and 
mathematician, wrote a letter under the name of Vincent 
Panurge, which he addressed to himself in this way, *' An 
epistle to that most eminent physician, John Baptist Morin, 
concerning the * Three Impostors J i" The three impostors 
to whom he refers were Gassendi, Neure, and Bernier, 
whom he wished to satirize under this title. Christian 
Kortholt in 1680 employed the same terms in his work 
against Hebert, Hobbes, and Spinoza. Such has been the 
use which the learned have made of this work when they 
wrote against their opponents, and in this way have they 
drawn upon the credulity of comparatively ignorant people, 
who, caring little to examine the evidences, have been de- 
ceived at once. Is it possible, that if such a work had real- 
ly existed, it would not have been refuted ; just as they re- 
futed the work concerning the Pre-Adamites, 12 written by 
M. de la Peyrere, — the discourses of Spinoza, and the pub- 
lications ofBodin ? The " Colloquium Heptaplomeres," al- 
though in manuscript, has been answered ; would ** The 
Three Impostors'' have met with more favour ? How comes 
it that it has not been condemned, and placed in the Index 
Expurgatorius, and how has it escaped cremation by the 
hands of the common hangman ? Books against morality 
have been sometimes tolerated, but those which strongly 
attack Religion do not escape with impunity. Florimond 
de Remond, who says that he had seen the book, asserts 

ii Vincentii Paiiurgii epistolade tribus impostoribus, ad clarissimum 
virura Joannem — Baptist&ni Morinum Mediciim. 

12 Isaac de Peyrere published his Pre-Adamite doctrine in 1655. 
This set of funaticts, who were persuaded by their leiidera that the gen. 
eral race of mankind had lost nothing of their innocence by the fall of 
Adam, made their appearance, (both men and women) in the streetsof 
Munster, and elsewhere, in the same robeless condition as our first pa- 
rents were, when th«y wandered in the bowers of Paradise before the 
eating of that forbidden fruit, which 

'^ Brought death into the world and all our woe/* 
The magistrates of the city attempted to put them down but failed ; and 
the military had some difficulty in extinguishing this absurdity. — Trans^ 
lalofs NoU. 



16 

that he was at that time a ymith, old enough perhaps to 
write fairy tales ; he quotes Ramus who liad been dead far 
thirty years, and could not convict him of falsehood ; he 
quotes Osius and Genebrard, but in in vague ter-ns, and 
without pointing out the passage in their works. He says 
that they were circulating this work— a work which if it 
existed, would unquestionably have been put under lock 
and key. Our opponents may produce a passage from Sir 
Thomas Browne, who, in the 19th sec. part I. of his work 
styled "Religio Medici,'^ translated from English into liHtiti 
by a distinguished scholar, uses the following w^ords ; " this 
impious man, the author of this blasphemous work, "The 
Three Impostors,' although a stranger to every religion, in- 
asmuch as he was neither a Jew, a Mahometan, wov a Chris- 
tian, was nevertheless evidently not an Atheist. 13" From 
this they would infer that he must have seen the book, when 
he speaks in such terms of its author. Now, Sir Thomas 
only says that Bernard Ochinus, who in his opinion was the 
author of the work, (as he hints in a foot note,) was more 
of a Deist than an Atheist, and that any Deist of ordirpiry 
average intellect and information, was capable of planning 
and executing such a design. Molikius, in a note upt)n the 
passage, denies and justly, that this work was written by 
Ochinus, for they assert that it was written in Latin, and we 
know that Ochinus never wrote but in Italian ; moreover if 
he had been suspected of having any connection wijh this 
work, his enemies, who made so much clamour against his 
dialogues concerning the Trinity and Polygamy, would not 
have spared him. But how can we reconcile Browne aitd 
Genebrard who con&ider Ochinus as a Mahometan, ar^d at 
the same time declare that he was neither a disciple of 
Moses, nor of Jesus Christ, nor of Mahomet ! 

Naude, by a strange mistake attributes the work to Yille- 
neuve, a comparatively ignorant writer, and Ernstius declares 
that at Rome he had learned from Campannelle, that Muret, 
a polished and accomplished author^ had written the work 

13 Monstrum illud hominis, diis inferis a secretisscelns, neffirii illiiis 
traciatns detribns impostoribus author qnantiiinvis nb omni Religione 
alienus, adeo ut ncc Jifdaeus, nee Turca, nee Chrislianus fuerit, plane 
tamen athoeus non erat. 



1? 

more than two centuries after Villaneure. Ernstius is mis- 
taken. Campannelle also refutes himself, for in the preface 
to his work, " Atheism overthown,*^ and still more explicitly 
in his discourse^ " Paganism indefensible," he affirms that 
this work came from Germany, but that it was the compo- 
sition of Muret ; a statement entirely opposite to that of 
Florimond de Remond alluded to before, which holds that 
the work was written in Germany but published elsewhere. 
Muret has therefore been falsely accused, and stands in 
need of no apology. They have judged of his religion from 
his life. The Huguenot party, vexed that after embracing 
their doctrines he had abandoned them forever, did not spare 
him on this occasion, and Beza, in his " Ecclesiastical 
History,' reproaches him with two crimes, the second being 
Atheism. Julius Scaliger, nettled by ajeu d^esprit of Muret's 
against him, has been led to do him injustice^*, « Muret," 
he says maliciously, " would have been a better Christian 
if he had believed in God ; I am aware that he tried to per- 
suade others to do so." In this way have originated false 
impressions against Muret. Instead of respecting his exem- 
plary piety, of which he gave striking evidence in the last 
years of his existence, they set themselves half a century 
after his death, to blacken his character by accusing him of 
crimes which were unknown to his most avowed enemies, 
and with which, in his life-time, we are certain that he never 
was charged. Some ignorant writers who possess no crit- 
ical acumen, have impeached without any reason whatever 
the first individual who occurred to their memory. Stephen 
Dolet of Orleans, Frances Pucci of Florence, John Milton 
of London, and Morula, a renegade Mahometan, have done 
so ; they have accused Peter Aretin, merely because he was 
a fearless and licentious writer, without reflecting that he 
was an uncultivated man, of no learning and scarcely mas- 
ter of his native tongue. For similar reasons they have 
blamed Poggio and others, and have even gone so far back 
as Boccaccio, most likely on account of the third tale in 
his Decameron, where he recounts the fable of three simi- 
lar rings, of which he makes a dangerous application to the 
Jewish, Christian, and Mahometan religions, as ii insinua- 

14 Consult Baylc's Dictionary on this subject, article, " Trahea.-' 
b2 



18 

ting that they might be embraced indifferenfly, since it 
was impossible to decide which of them ought to have the 
preference. Neither have these writers forgot Michiavel ; 
and Decker impeaches Rabelais. The Dutchman also 
who translates into French the " Religio Medici" of Sir 
Thomas Browne, in the notes to his 20th chap, accuses 
Erasmus as well as Machiavel. 

With more apparent reason they attack both Pomponacius 
and Cardan. The former, in his treatise on the immortal- 
ity of the soul, where he reasons as a philosopher and speaks 
abstractly of the Catholic faith — in which (at the end of 
his work) he solemnly professes himself a believer — is bold 
enough to add that the doctrine of the immortality of the 
soul had been propounded by the orignators of every religi- 
ous creed ii) order to keep their followers in thrall, and that 
therefore the majority of the human race had been duped. 
" If the Jewish, Christian, and Mahometan religions,^' he 
continues, "are all three of them impostures, it follows that 
thehalf of mankind are mistaken." This absurd reasoning, 
in spite of the precautions of Pomponacious, reached Jac- 
ques Carpentier, and induced him to exclaim, " Can any 
thing be conceived of more truly pernicious than this scep- 
ticism, coming as it does from a Christian school of theo- 

Cardan goes still farther wrong in the eleventh of his 
discourses " On Sophistry," where, after minutely compa- 
ring Paganism, Judaism, Christianity, and Mahometanism, 
and setting the one to contradict the other, without express- 
ing belief in any of them, he finishes rashly in this way ; 
" his igitur arbitrio victories relictes," that is, he leaves it to 
chance to decide the victory ; an expression however which 
he himself corrected in the second edition of his work.— 
This retraction did not save him from being most bitterly 
attacked three years afterward by Joseph Scaliger, on ac- 
count of the fearful import of the language he had made use 
of, and of the indifference it showed on the part of Cardan 
as to which of the four parties might gain the victory, 
and as to whether that victory were gained by argument or 
arms. 

15 Quid vel hac sola dubitatione in CbristiaDa schola cogltara potest 
peruiciosius? 



In the last article of the work *• Naiidiana," which is ^ 
thapsodical compound of blunders and falsehood, ther^ are 
some confused references to '' The Three Impostors." The 
author asserts that Ramus had attributed it to Postel ; 
nothing whatever can be found in the writings of Ramus to 
establish this. Postel was a singular visionary. Henry 
Stephanus relates that he had been heard to say, that out 
of the three religions, the Jewish, the Christian, and the 
Mahometan, a good one might be made. However, in no 
part of his work does he call in question the mission of 
Moses, or the divinity of Christ ; neither does he venture 
to maintain in exact terms that the devout Venetian Hospi- 
taller, whom he calls " his mother Jeanne,'^ would be the 
Redeemer of women, as Christ had been the Redeemer of 
men. After explaining that in men there is a masculine 
part, the animus, and a feminine part, the anima, he has 
the absurdity to add that both parts were corrupted by sin 
and that " his mother Jeanne^' might restore the feminine 
as Christ had restored the masculine. The book in which 
he utters this absurdity was printed at Paris in. 1553, and 
is by no means so rare but that copies may easily be found. 
From it we can gather that he would have published the 
other works also, if it had been true that he had reached 
this pitch of blasphemy. So far from this being the case, 
he writes (1543) that the book was written by Michael Ser- 
vetus ; and long afterwards he does not scruple to avenge 
himself on his Huguenot calumniators, by accusing them, 
in a letter addressed to Masius, ( 1563) of having themselves 
printed the work at Caen : *nhis infamous commentary or 
discourse against Moses, Christ, and Mahomet, was lately 
printed at Csen, by those who profess themselves the keenest 
supporters of the Calvinistic doctrines. i^" In the same 
chapter of *'Naudiana," mention is made of one Barnaud, 
but in terms so perplexed that little can be drawn from them 
except that he had seen an octavo work of 98 pages, printed 
in 1613, entitled " The Geneva Booby." It did not bear 
where it had been printed, neither was the author's name 

16 Nefarium tillud riura impostoriim commentum sen liber contra 
Christum, Moisem et Mahometan Capomi nuper ab illisqui Evadgelo 
Calvini so adductissimos profitentur typis excussus est. 



20 

given. Perliaps it might have been written by Henri de 
Sponde, aferwards Bishop of Pamier ; who says, that at 
that period there lived a physician named Barnaud an Arian, 
who had composed this treatise. Now this would make it 
of a comparatively recent date. The only sensible article 
in "Naudiana" is towards its conclusion, where Naude, a 
man of vast experience as a bibliologist, is made to declare 
that he had never seen the work alluded to^ that he did not 
believe such a work had ever been printed, and that he con^^ 
Sidered every thing which had been said on this subject as 
mere invention and fable. 

To this list may be added that notable atheist Julius Cse* 
sar Vanini, burned at Toulouse under the name of Lucilius 
Vaninus, who was accused of having circulated this vile 
work in France some years before he was put to death* 

If there are writers so credulous and devoid of common 
sense as to believe in these ineoherencies, asserting that the 
book was publicly sold in many quarters of Europe, they 
ought to set the matter at rest by producing a single copy ; 
for it cannot be in the case supposed, that the work is so 
rarely to be met with. But no person has seen a copy> 
neither of the edition said to have been published by Chris- 
tian Wechel at Paris, abont the middle of the 16th century, 
nor of that which they attribute to Nachtegal, as printed at 
the Hague, 1614 or 1615. Father Theophylus Reynaud 
states that the former had sunk into extreme poverty from 
the visitations of heaven ; and Miiller relates of the latter 
that he was banished from the Hague with infamy. Bayle 
in his dictionary (article W^chell^ clearly refutes the calum* 
ny against this printer ; and in regard to Natchtegal, Spi* 
zelius informs us that he was a native of Alkmaer, and ban- 
ished, not for having published this supposiiious work, but 
for having given utterance to other blasphemies. Now, 
W'hen we look over with attention and patience what Vin- 
cent Placcius says in the folio edition of his immense w^ork 
concerning " Anonymous writers, and authors who write 
under false names," and what Christian Kertholt says in 
his work revised by his son Sebastian regarding " The 
Three Impostors," and finally what Struvius advances in 
his treatise (1706) on *' Learned Impostors," we can find 
nothing at all to prove that such a work ever existed ; and 



21 

it is astonishing that Struvins, who in spite of the most spe- 
cious evidence which Tentzelius had offered him to prove 
its existence, had always maintained the contrary, was at 
last persuaded to believe that there really was such a work; 
and that too, for the most frivolous reason which it is pos- 
sible to conceive. 

In the preface of "Atheism Overthrown," he discovers 
that the author of this work, in order to vindicate himself 
from the crime laid to his charge, declares that '• The 
Three Impostors" had been published thirty years before 
he was born. This is a strange discovery, but it appeared 
so satisfactory to Stnrvius that he ceased to doubt in the- 
existence of such a book, because he knew the year in 
which Campannelle was born (1568.) and knew also that 
the book was printed thirty years bt^fore this, viz. in 1538. 
Afterwards in pushing their researches farther, they re- 
solved to consider Baccaccio as the author of the work, from 
a misinterpreted passage in Chap 2, No. 6, in the *'Athe- 
ism Overthrown'' where the following words occur ; "Hence 
Boccaccio in his impious fables, conteruls that there is no 
distinction between the law of Moses, of Christ and of Maho- 
met, because they are as like eacli other as the three similar 
rings. tT'" But does (Campannelle, in this passnoe intend 
to say that Boccaccio was the author of " The Three Im- 
postors ?" So far is this from being the case, that he an- 
swers elsewhere the objections of the Atheists against Boc- 
caccio and the book in question ; and Struvius himself, in 
the 9th paragra[)h of his dissertation on "Learned 1 mpostors"" 
quotes a passage from Ernstius, which states that Campan- 
nelle had told him that the book was written by Muret ; 
now Muret liavirjg been born in 1526, and the bo(jk been 
pririted in 1538, he could only have been 12 years of age ; 
at which time of life we canrjot suppose it possible that he 
was able to write a work of this description. It follov^'s 
therefore that this book, said to have been written in Latin 
and printed in Germany, never existed. At no period has 
there been a printed work, however rarely to be met with^ 

17 Hinc Bo 'caccins in fabeiils probare contendit non posse <)iscj3rni 
inter legem Christi, Moisis et Mahometis, quia eadem signa liabeiit uti 
Ires annuli consimiles. 



22 

in reference to which very authentic and circumstantial 
information could not be found. 

Although the works of Michael Servetus may never 
be met with, it has always been well known that they 
were printed, and moreover where they were printed. Be- 
fore the publication of the two modern editions of the "Cym- 
balum Mundi," composed by Bonnaventure de Perrieres, 
writirig under the assumed name ofThomas du Clevier, who 
says that he had translated it from the Latin, and of which 
work only two ancient copies remain, the one in the King's 
library and the other in that of M. Bigot at Rouen ; — before 
the publication of the the modern editions, it wa?j an ascer- 
tained fact that the work had been printed, and the date and 
name of the bookseller were known. The case is exactly 
the same as regards " The Blessings of Christianity, or the 
Scourge of the Faiih," the author of which, Geoffrey Vallee 
a native of Orleans, was hanged and burned at Greve, on 
the 9th February 1573, after having adjured his errors. It 
is a small octavo vi'ork of thirty pages, without date, or the 
name of the place where it was prirUed ; a tride, feebly rea- 
soned, and now become so rare that perhaps the copy be- 
longing to Monsieur the Abbe d'Estrees is the only one to 
be found. But although all these WM)rks had absolutely per- 
ished, no one could doubt their previous existence, the facts 
on record concerning them being as true, as those concerning 
^ The Three Impostors' are apocrypha!. 



23 



TO THE DISSERTATION OF MONSIEUR DE LA MONNOYE 
ON THE WORK ENTITULED 

" THE THREE INPOSTORS." 



An attempt at discussion, which you will find at the end 
of the new edition of *' Menagiana," which has just been 
published in this country, affords me the opportunity of 
giving some information to the public on a subject which 
appears to call into exercise the ingenuity of almost all 
the learned ; and at the same time of vindicating the 
character of many eminent men, and men of distinguished 
merit, who have been attacked as the authors of the work 
which forms the subject of a disquisition attributed to M. 
de la Monnoye. Without doubt this new book is already 
in your possession ; you will perceive that I allude to " The 
Three Impostors." The author of the dissertation upholds the 
non-existence of such a book, and attempts to establish his 
point by bringing forward conjectures, without advancing 
any evidence capable in the smallest degree of influencing 
the opinions of those who are accustomed to examine before 
they decide. I will not undertake to refute seriatim the 
articles contained in a dissertation, the substance of which 
is to be found in a Latin discourse by M. Burchard Gottheffle 
Struves, on " Learned Impostors," printed for the second 
time at Geneva, by Muller in 1706, and which M. de la Mon- 
noye must have seen, because he quotes from it. He will 
acknowledge that I am quite prepared to overturn his argu- 
ments, when I inform him that I have read this celebrated 
little work, and that I have it in my library. I will give 
you and the public an account of the way in which I dis- 
covered it, and as it is in my possession, I will subjoin a 
short but faithful description of it. 

Being at Frankfort on the Main in 1706, 1 called one day 
in company with a Jew, and a friend named Frecht, at that 



24 

•lime a student in Theology, on an eminent bookseller in 
v/hose establishment alinorit every work was to be met 
with. We were examining his catalogue when there entered 
a German officer, who addressed himself to the proprietor in 
German, and asked him if he was ready to agree to his pro- 
posals, or if another merchant should be sought after. Freeh t, 
who formerly was acquainted with the officer, saluted him 
and w^as recognised. This gave an oportuiiity to my 
friend of asking the officer, whose name was Trawsendorff, 
what transaction he had with the bookseller. Trawsen- 
dorfftold him that he had two manuscripts and a very old 
book m his possession, by the sale of which he expected to 
raise a sum of money against the approaching campaign, 
and that the bookseller higgled on 50 Rix-doUars, being 
unwilling to advance more than 450 for the three works, 
which he, (the officer), valued at 500. This great sum 
of money demanded for two manuscripts and a liittle book 
excited the curiosity of Frecht, who asked of his friend if 
he might see the productions which he wished to sell at so 
dear a rate. Trawsendorfl' im.mediately drew from his 
pocket a parchment envelope, tied with a silk thread, which 
he opened, and from which he took the three books. We 
went into the parlour of the bookseller to examine them at 
our leisure, and the first which Frecht looked at had been 
printed, but had a title written in Italian instead of its real 
title, which had been defaced. It ran thus; "' Spaccio 
della Bestia triumphante," and did not appear to be of an 
ancient date. It struck me as being the same work which 
Toland translated into English, and printed some years ago, 
and the copies of which sell very high. 

The second we looked at was an old Latin manuscript 
written in a character very difficult to decypher, without 
any title ; but at the top of the first page there were written 
these words, '' Fredric the Emperor wishes health to Otho, 
his most illustrious and dearest friend.*" 

The work opens v^^ith a letter, the first lines of which are 
as follows ; " I will send you as soon as possible a copy of 
the work on the three most celebrated deceivers of mankind, 

* F. I. S, D. namely, Fredericus Imperator Salutem Dicit Othoui 
iliustrisslmo amico meo carrissitno* 



25 

a work written at my request by a very learned man, and 
transcribed by my order for my library ; and along with it 
another work written in the same pure and polished style, 
for, &c.'* The third was also a Latin manuscript without 
a title, commencing with a quotation from Cicero. 

Frecht having glanced over the books in a hurried way, 
fixed his attention upon the second, of which he had often 
heard, and in respect to which he had read many conflict- 
ing histories ; and without looking into the other two, he 
took TrawsendorflT aside and told him that he would easily 
find purchasers of the three works. He spoke little of the 
Italian work, and by reading a few passages he shov/ed 
him that the other was a demonstration of Atheism. As 
the bookseller still held to his terms, and would not come 
up to the officer's demand, we w^ent all three to the lodg- 
ings of Frecht, who having an object in view called for 
wine, and while begging TrawsendorfF to inform us how he 
came by the works, he made him swallow so many bum- 
pers that be soon became half intoxicated, so that Frecht 
had little difficulty in persuading him to leave with him the 
manuscript of " The Three most celebrated Deceivers of 
Mankind ;'' but he made him take a solemn oath that he would 
not copy it. On this condition, the Work was to be left 
with us from Wednesday till Sunday night, when Trawsen- 
dorfF was to call again and take his share of a few bottles 
of Frecht's wine, which seemed to be much to his taste. 

As I had quite as much desire as Frecht to be acquaint- 
ed with the book, we sat down immediately to read it over, 
determining to sleep very little until Sunday night. It was 
pot very large — an octavo work of ten sections, exclusive of 
the prefatory letter, but in so small a character, and so full 
of contractions, besides being without points, that we had 
much difficulty in decyphering the first page in two hours. 
After this however we read it more easily, which made me 
suggest to my friend a plan (rather Jesuitical) whereby he 
might obtain a copy of this celebrated work without break- 

*Q,uod de tribus famosissimis nationimi deceptoribus in ordinem 
jussu meo digessit doclissimns illo vir quorum sermouem de ilia re in 
maseo meo habustiae exscribi curavi; atque Codicem ilium stylo aeque 
vero ac piiro scriptuin ad te quatn primum mitto; etenum, <&c. 

c 



26 

ing his oath which he had taken on compulsion ; — that it 
was likely that Trawsendorff, when he insisted that it should 
not be copied, only meant that he should not transcribe 
the words — in short that we were quite at liberty to trans- 
late it. To which Frecht consented after some scruples, 
and we set to work immediately. On Sunday we were in 
possession of the work a little before midnight. Trawsen- 
dorff afterwards got his 500 rix-dollars for the work from a 
bookseller who had been commissioned by a Prince of the 
House of Saxe to purchase it. The Prince knew that 
it had been stolen from the Royal Library at Munich, 
when the Germans obtained possession of the city after the 
defeat of the French and Bavarians at Hochstet, and Traw- 
sendorff acknowledged to us that, being alone in the library 
of the Elector, the parchment envelope with its yellow silk 
thread attracted his attention, and that he could not resist 
the temptation to steal it : expecting that it contained some 
rare production, in which he was not disappointed. 

To complete the history of this treatise, I will give you 
the conjectures which Frecht and I made as to its origin. 
We agreed at once that the " Illustrisslmo Otho^ to whom 
it was sent, was " Otho the Tllustrious," Duke of Bavaria, 
son of Louis L and grandson of *' Otho the Great," Count 
of Schiven and Witelspach, to whom the Emperor Frederick 
Barbarossa had given Bavaria as a reward for his fidelity, 
after he took it away from " Henry the Lion," as a punish- 
ment for his ingratitude. " Otho the Illustrious" succeeded 
his father Louis I, in 1230, under the reign of Fredrick H, 
grandson of Frederick Barbarossa, who had at that time 
quarrelled with the Count of Rome on his return from Je- 
rusalem. This led us to think that the letters F. L S. D. 
which followed the " Amico meo carissimo,^^ denoted Fred- 
ericus Imperator Salutem Dicit, and that the treatise was 
wirtten posterior to the year 1230, by the order of this Em- 
peror, inflamed as he was against all Religions in conse- 
quence of the bad treatment he had met with from the head 
of his own, viz. Pope Gregory IX. by whom he had been 
excommnnicated before he set out, and who persecuted him 
even in Syria by intriguing to such an extent, that the 
Emperor's army refused to obey his orders. This Prince 
on his return besieged the Pope at Rome, after having 



27 

ravaged the neighboring territory, and thereafter made a 
peace with him which w^as of no long duration, and which 
was followed by an animosity so bitter between him and 
the Holy Pontiff, that it only ceased at the death of the 
latter, who died heart-broken that Frederick triumphed in 
spite of his empty fulminations, and that he had unmasked 
the vices of the Papal Chair in satirical verses which he 
circulated in every quarter, — in Germany, Italy, and France. 
But we could not discover who was the " doctissimus vir^^'* 
with whom Otho appears to have held converse on the 
subject in the library, and apparently in the company of 
the Emperor ; unless indeed it were the celebrated Pierre 
des Vignes, the secretary, or as others maintain, the chan- 
cellor of Frederick II. His discourse " On Sovereign 
Power," and his ^^ Letters," give proof of his learning, and 
the zeal w^hich he had for the interests of his master, and 
of his own hatred of Pope Gregory IX, and the Ecclesi- 
astics and established Churches of his day. It is true, that 
in one letter he attempts to exculpate his master from the 
charges against him as the author of this book : but this 
strengthens the supposition, and inclines us to think he 
only pleaded for Frederick, to cloak his own share in so 
scandalous a work. At all events we must believe that he 
would have confessed the truth when Frederick, on sus- 
picion that he had conspired against his life, condemned 
him to lose his eyes, and handed him over to the inhabitants 
of Pisa, his cruel enemies ; and where despair hurried on 
his death in an infamous dungeon where he could hold 
intercourse with no one. 

In this way we can repel the false charges brought 
against Averroes, Boccaccio, Dolet, Aretino, Servetus, 
Ochinus, Postel, Pompanacius, Campannelle, Poggio, Pulci, 
Muret, Vanini, Milton, and many others ; the book having 
been written by a learned man in high repute at the court 
of this Emperor, and by his order. As to the printing of 
the book they can bring forward no /jroq/* whatever ; and it 
is impossible to conceive that Frederick, surroi^pded as he 
was by enemies, would have circulated a work which gave 
fair opportunity of proclaiming his infidelity. It is probable 
therefore that there are only two copies, the original one 
and that sent to Otho of Bavaria. 



y 



28 



This will suffice as to the discovery of the book, and its 
date ; we come now to what it contains. 

It is divided into six books or chapters, every one of 
which contains several pagaraphs. The first Chapter has 
for its title " Of God," and contains six paragraphs in which 
the author, wishing to appear free from party or educational 
prejudices, sliows that although mankind have a real inter- 
est in ascertaining the truth, nevertheless they found upon 
opinions and imaginations alone ; and meeting with peo- 
ple whose interest it is to keep them in this state, they are 
made to rest contented in it, although they could easily shake 
off the yoke by making the slighest use of their reason. He 
passes next to the ideas which men entertain of the Divi- 
nity, and prove that they are injurious, inasmuch as they 
have led to the creation of the most fearful and imperfect 
being whom it is possible to conceive of; and he then 
blames the ignorance of the people, or rather their foolish 
credulity in putting faith in the visions of Prophets and 
Apostles, of whom he draws a portrait suited to the ideas 
which he entertains of them. 

The second Chapter treats of the reasons which have 
led men to believe in a divinity. It is divided into eleven 
paragraphs, where he proves that the ignorance of physi- 
cal causes has given birth to a fear natural enough at the 
sight of a thousand terrible accidents, and has led them to 
believe in the existence of some invisible Power ; a doubt, 
and a fear, of which subtle politicians have taken advan- 
tage, for their own interest, and which have given rise to 
a belief in this Existence, which has been confirmed by 
others who have found it for their own benefit to maintain 
it; although it is merely grounded on the folly of the com- 
mon people, always admirers of the extraordinary, the sub- 
lime, and the marvellous. He next inquires into the 
nature of the Divinity, and overturns the vulgar belief in 
final causes, as contrary to sound philosophy. In fine, 
he makes it appear that such ideas of the Divinity are only 
formed after having decided what is perfect, good, evil, 
virtue, vi#B, according to imagination, and often as false as 
possible. In his tenth paragraph the author explains his 
own opinion as to the Divinity, which is conformable to 
the system of the Pantheists, saying that the word God 



29 

represents an infinite Being, one of whose attributes is 
that he is of unlimited extension, and consequently that 
he is infinite and eternal. In the eleventh paragraph he 
treats with ridicule the popular opinion which is given to the 
Deity, a resemblance to the kings of the earth ; and passing 
to the sacred books, he speaks of them in a very unfavour- 
able manner. 

The third Chapter has for its tittle ** The signification 
of the word Theology, and how, and for what purpose so 
many religions have been introduced into the world." — 
This chapter contains twenty-three paragraphs. In the 
ninth he examines the origin of religions ; and brings 
forward examples and reasonings which, so far from being 
divine, are altogether the work of politicians. In the tenth 
paragraph he undertakes to expose the imposture of Moses, 
showing what he was, and how he managed to establish 
the Jewish religion. In the eleventh paragraph he in- 
quires into the impostures of several politicians such as 
Numa, and Alexander the Great. In the twelfth he ex- 
amines the birth of Jesus Christ ; in the thirteenth and 
following he considers his morality, which he does not 
think more pure than that of a great number of ancient 
philosophers ; in the nineteenth he inquires whether his 
reputation after his death is sufficient to warrant his believing 
in his divinity. Lastly, in the twenty-second and twenty- 
third paragraphs, he considers the imposture of Mahomet, of 
whom he does not say so much, because he has not to en- 
counter so many advocates of his doctrine as that of the 
two others. 

The fourth Chapter treats of truth evident and obvious to 
the senses, and consists only of sixth paragraphs, where ho 
demonstrates what really is the divinity, and what are his 
attributes : he rejects the belief in a life to come, and the 
existence of spirits. 

The fifth Chapter treats '' Of the Soul." It consists of 
seven paragraphs in which, after having exposed the vulgar 
opinions, he gives those of the Philosophers of antiquity, 
and concludes by showing the nature of the Soul accord- 
ing to his own system. 

In the sixth and last Chapter of seven paragraphs, he 
discourses on the Spirits called Demons, and shows the 

c3 



: 30 

origin and falsify of the opinions as to their existence. 
— Such is the anatomy of this celebrated work. I might 
have given it in a manner more extended and more minute ; 
but besides that this letter is already too long, I think that 
enough has been said to give insight into the nature of its 
contents^ A thousand other reasons which you will well 
enough understand, have prevented me from entering upon 
it to so great a length as I could have done ; ^^ E.st modus 
in rebus.*" 

Now although this book were ready to be printed with the 
preface in which I have given its history, and its discove- 
ry, with some conjectures as to its origin, and a few re- 
marks which may be placed at its conclusion, yet I do not 
believe that it will live to see the day when men will be com- 
pelled all at once to quit their opinions and their imagina- 
tions, as they have quited their syllogisms, their canons^, 
and their other antiquated modes. As for me I will not 
expose rnyself to the Theological stylus^, which I fear as 
much as Fra-Poulo feared the Roman stylus, to afford to a. 
few learned men the pleasure of reading this little treatise ;; 
but neither will I be so superstitious, on my death bed, as 
to make it be thrown into the flames, which we are in- 
formed was done by Salvius, the Swedish ambassador at 
the peace of Munster. Those who come after me may da. 
what seems them good — they cannot disturb me in the 
tomb. Before I descend to that, I remain with much re- 
spect, your most obedient servant, J. L. R. L. 

Leyden, 1st January 1716. 

['['his letter was written by M. Pierre Frederick Arpe., 
of Kiel in Hplstien ; the author of an apology for Vanini^ 
grinted in octavo at Rotterdam, 1712. ] 

* There is a measure in every thing. 

t This phrase is frequently employed to express ecclesiastical cri- 
ticism. Its first application however had a more pungent meaning. — 
The individual here alluded to having boldly assailed the errors of the 
Church was attacked one evening by an assassin. Fortunately th© 
blow did not prove fatal; but the weapon (a stylus, or dagger, which is 
also the Latin name for a pen) having been left in the wound — on hia 
recovery he wore it in his gi die labelled, "The Theological Stylus/' 
or Pen of the Church. The trenchant powers of this instrument have 
more frequently beeu employed to repress truth, than to refute argu- 
ment. 



ai 



COPY OF THE SECONB PART, VOL. I. ARTICLE IX. OF, 
'' LITERARY MEMOIRS," PUBLISHED AT THE HAGUE 
BY HENRY DU SAUZET, 1716. 

It is impossible in ibe present day to doubt the existence 
of '* The Three Imposters," since we find several manuscript 
copies of it. If M. de la Monneye had observed the agree- 
ment of it with an extract published at Leyden, 1st. Jan. 
1716, — the same division inta six chapters — the same ti- 
tles, and the same subjects of which they treal, he would 
have exclaimed against the forgery of this work, improperly 
attributed to Pierre des Vignes, the vSecretary and Chan* 
cellor of Frederick II. This judicious critic long ago ob- 
served the difference between the Gothic style of Pierre 
des Pigries in his Epistles, and that of the letter pretend- 
ed to be addressed to the Duke of Bavaria, " Otho the il- 
lustrious," when they sent him the work. A more impor- 
tant point has not escaped the notice of the learned. This 
treatise is written and argued in the method and upon the 
principles of the New Philosophy, which was not introduc- 
ed until about the middle of the seventeenth century, after 
Descartes, Gassendi, Bernier, and some others had ex- 
plained its principles in a juster and clearer way than did 
the ancient philosophers, who wished to preserve their 
SBcrets, as they afiected a mysterious obscurity in favor of 
the initiated. The author himself, in the fifteen chapter of 
bis work, names Descartes, and combats the arguments of 
this great man on the subject of the soul. Neither Pierre 
des Vignes, nor any of those whom they have attempted to 
pass off* as the author of this book, could have reasoned ac- 
cording to the principles of the new Philosophy, which was 
not introduced till after they had written. To whom then 
must the work be attributed ? We must conclude that it 
cannot be of the same date as the short letter printed at 
Leyden, 1717. But another difficulty occurs. Tentzelius, 
who wrote in 1689, also gives an extract from this book 
upon the credit of" a pretended ocular witness. But with- 
out attempting to fix the date of this book, which is said to 
have bqen composed in Latin and printed ; the small French 



32 

manuscript treatise, whether it had ever been written in 
that language or whether it is translated from the Latin, 
(which is difficult to believe,) cannot be of a very ancient 
date. 

This is not the only book composed under this title and 
upon the same subject. A man whose character and pro- 
fession ought to have led him to engage in matters more 
decorous, composed a great work (in French) under the 
same title. In his preface he says that it is long since he 
had heard of '' The Three Impostors," but that he had 
never found any part of it, whether there had never existed 
such a work, or whether it be lost ; therefore he attempts 
to restore it by writing on the same subject. His work is 
very long, very wearisome, and very badly written ; with 
little principles and less argument. It is a confused jum- 
ble of all the invectives and calumnies circulated against 
the Three Legislators. The manuscript was in two 
volumes folio, thick, and legible enough, although in small 
characters — the book is divided into a great many chapters. 
Another similar manuscript was found after the death of a 
nobleman. This gave rise to an attempt to seize the author 
who having been informed of it took care that nothing should 
be found among his papers to convict him. Afterwards he 
lived in a monastery under penance. In 1733 he recover-^ 
ed his liberty and enjoyed a revenue of 250 livres from the 
Abbey of St. Liquarie, in addition to a reserved one of 350 
livres from his benefice. His name was Guillaume, Cure 
of Fresne-sur-Berny, and the brother of a labourer in the 
Netherlands. He was at one time Regent of the College 
of Montaigu ; in his youth he had been a dragoon, and then 
be became a Capuchin. 



CONTENTS OF TREATISE. 



CHAP. I. Of God. The false ideas which men have formed of t^.e^ 
Divinity. Instead of consulting reason and common sense, they 
have had the weakness to believe in the opinions, reveries, and vi- 
sions of parties whose interest it was to deceive them, and to keep 
them in ignorance and superstition. 

CHAP. H. On the reasons which have led men to believe in a 
Divinity. From the ignorance as to physical causes, arid the terror 
produced by accidents, rational enough but extraordinary or fearful^ 
has arisen the belief in some invisib'e power ; a belief, of which 
Politicians and Impostors have not failed to lake advantage. Enqui-ry 
into the nature nf God. Belief in final causes refuted as contrary to 
sound Natural Philosophy. 

CHAP. III. On the meaning of the word T/ifoZoory. How, and for 
what purpose, so many Religions have been introduced into the 
world. All Religions the work of Politicians. Method which Moses 
took to establish the Jewish Religion. Enquiry into the Nativity 
of Jesus Christ. His Politics — his Morality — and his Reputation 
after his deuih. Ariifices of Mahouiet to established his Religion, 
Success of this impostor greater than that of Chrisit. 

CHAP. IV. Truth evident and obvious to the senses. Idea of .sn 
universal Bein^^ Attributes ascribed to him in a'l religious sys- 
tems, generally incompatible with his essence, and unsuited to iho 
nature of man. Notion of a life to come and of the existence of 
Spirits, combated and rejected. 

CHAP. V. On the Soul. DitTerent opinions of the Ancient Philoso- 
phers on the nature of the Soul. Arguments of Descartes refuted. 
Author's exposition on the subject. 

CHAP. VI. On the Spirits named Demons. Origi» and falsity of 
the ooinious as to their existence. 



A TREATISE 

ON 



Chap. I.— Of GOD., 

H- 

Although it is important that all men should know the 
truth, there are nevertheless few who enjoy this advantage ; 
some are incapable of finding it out unassisted, and others 
will not put themselves to the trouble. It is not to be won- 
dered at therefore, if the world is filled with vain and ab- 
surd opinions ; and nothing is more adapted to spread them 
than ignorance, v/hich is the sole originator of the false ideas 
which prevail as to the Divinity, the Soul, the existence of 
Spiriis, and almost all the other subjects which go to make 
up Theology. Custom is powerful — men rest contented in 
the prejudices of their birth, and leave the care of the most 
essential matters to interested parties, who make it a rule 
to uphold with bigotry the received opinions, and who 
dare not overturn them lest in so doing they should destroy 
themselves. 

§3. 

What renders the evil without remedy is this, that, after 
having established these false ideas of the Divinity, they 
neglect no plan to compel the people \o believe in them, 
without permitting any one to examine for himself. On 
the contrary, they have excited a hatred against philosophers 
^^— the truly learned, lest the doctrines which they would 
teach should lead to the exposure of those errors in which 
they have plunged mankind. The advocates of these fool* 
ish notions have succeeded so well, that it is dangerous to 
cpmbat them. It is too much the interest of those impos- 



tors tliat the people be ignorant, to permit tliem to become 
enlightened. Thus the truth must either be kept in abey- 
ance, or its promoters be prepared to be sacrificed at the 
shrine of a false philosophy, and to suffer from the rage of 
grovelling and interested minds. 

If the people could understand into what an abyss they 
are sunk by ignorance, thep would speedily shake off the 
yoke of their unworthy leaders, for it is impossible not to 
discover the truth when reason is left to its unrestrained 
exercise. 

These deceivers are so well aware of this, that to prevent 
the good effects which Truth would infallibly produce, they 
have painted it as a monster incapable of giving rise to any 
virtuous sentiment ; although, in general terms, they con- 
demn unreasonable people, they would nevertheless be much 
disconcerted if the truth w^ere heard. Thus these sworn 
enemies to common sense are perpetually falling into con- 
tradictions, and it is difficult to discover at what they are 
aiming. If it be true that reason is the only light which 
men ought to follow, and if the people are not so incapable 
of judging as they wish us to believe, it ought to be the 
object of those who instruct them to endeavour to rectify the 
false reasonings, and to uproot their prejudices ; then their 
eyes would be gradually opened and their minds convinced 
that the Deity is by no means what is generally supposed. 

M- 

To attain this, there is no need for lofty speculations, nor 
for penetrating far into the mysteries of nature. Itrequires 
only a little common sense to perceive that the Deity is 
neither choleric nor jealous ; that justice and mercy are 
alike falsely considered as his attributes ; and that all that 
the Prophets and Apostles have said give us no information 
either as to his nature, or to his essence. 

In short to speak plainly and to put the matter on its pro- 
per footing, it will be allowed that these teachers were nei- 
ther more able nor better instructed than the rest of mankind; 
so far from that being the case, what they advance regar- 



\L 



36 



ding ilie Deity is so gross that the people must be altogether 
ignorant to credit it. Although this is apparent enough we 
will attempt to explain it more at length, by inquiring, if 
there is any evidence that the Prophets and Apostles were 
differently constituted from other men. 

§5. 

It is agreed, that as far as descent, and the common duties 
of life are implicated, they possessed no quality to mark 
them out from the rest of mankind. They were begotten 
by men, they were born of women, and they sustained them- 
selves as we do in the present day. In Reference to their 
minds, people would have us believe that God dealt with 
these prophets in a way differing from that wherein he deals 
with ordinary mortals, and that he disclosed himself to them 
in a manner quite exclusive. Many persons consider this 
matter as a proved and ascertained fact, without reflecting 
that every man may meet his counterpart, and that we have 
one common origin ; endeavouring at the same time to 
persuade us that these men were cast in no common mould 
and that they were selected by the Deity to proclaim his 
oracles. Now, apart from the consideration that these in- 
spired people were gifted with only an average intellect, and 
with an understanding not much above the common, what 
do we find in their writings to justify us in forming so ex- 
alted an opinion of them ? The matter of w^hich they treat 
is for the most part so obscure that no one can comprehend 
it, and thrown together with so little order that it is easy 
to perceive they did not understand it themselves; the whole 
showing that they were both knaves and fools. Their im- 
pudence in boasting that whatever they announced to the 
people came immediately from God, gave rise to the respect 
which was paid to them. This assertion on their part was 
equally absurd and ridiculous, seeing that according to their 
own declaration God only spoke to them in dreams. There 
is nothing more natural than that a man should dream ; but 
a man must be very impudent, very vain, and very stupid, 
to say that God speaks to him in this manner, and a poor 
and credulous fool must he be who should yield credence 
to such an assertion, and receive the dreams of such vision- 



37 

aeries for heavenly oracles. Suppose for a moment that the 
Deity were to hold intercourse with a man by dreams, or 
visions, or in any other way we can think of; nobody is 
obliged to believe this on the mere assertion of a fellow- 
creature equally subject to error with himself, and moreover, 
fallible in the way of lying and imposture. Accordingly 
we find that under the ancient law, the prophets were held 
in far less repute than they are at the present day. When 
people got wearied of their babble, which often only tend- 
ed to spread revolt and to turn aside suhjects from obedience' 
to their sovereigns, they silenced them by punishment. 
Jesus Christ himself did not escape chastisement. Tor he 
had not, like Moses"^, an army at his back to defend his 
opinions. Add to this, that the prophets were so much ac- 
custom-ed to contradict each other, that out of four hundred 
ef them not one true or truth -speaking man could be found.f 
Moreover it is certain that the drift of their prophesies, like 
that of the laws promulgated by the most celebrated legis- 
lators, was to immortalize their memory by persuading peo- 
ple that they had conferences with the Divinity. The most 
subtle politicians have invariably played the same garae,[ 
although this ruse has* not succeeded with every one as it 
did with Moses. 

§■6. 

This being settled, let us examine for a little the idea 
which the Prophets have formed of the Deity. According 
to their account, God is a being purely corporeal. Michael 
saw him seated ; Daniel beheld him clothed in white, and 
under the form of an Old Man ; Ezekiel perceived him as 
a Fire : so much for the Old Testament. With respect to 
the New, the disciples of Jesus Christ imagined that they 
saw him in the form of a Dove ; the Apostles, like Tongues 
of Fire ; and finally, St. Paul beheld him as a Light, which 
dazzled and blinded him. Then as to their contradictory 

* Moses put to death in one day 24,000 men, because they resisted 
his laws. 

t We read in the Book of Kings, chap, xxii, v. 6, that Ahab, the King 
of Israel consulted 400 prophets who were all false, as the result of their 
vaticinations showed. 

D 



38 

statements ; in the Book of Genesis* we are informed that 
man is the master of his own actions, and that it only de- 
pends npon himself to do what is right. St. Paul on the 
other hand asserts that man has no control over his evil 
propensities w^ithout the particular grace of God. Samuelf 
declares that the Deity repented of the evil which he had 
brought on men : and Jeremiah^ affirms that he repented, or 
on certain conditions that he would repent, of the ^ot^c? which 
he had done them. Such are the false and contradictory 
ideas which those pretenders to inspiration give us of the 
divinity ; and which they wish us to adopt without reflect- 
ing that they represent the Deity as a sensitive Being, ma- 
terial, and subject to like passions with ourselves. Next 
they inform us that God has nothing in common with mat- 
ter, and that his nature is altogether incomprehensible by 
us. It would be important to learn how these manifest and 
irrational contradictions can be reconciled ; and whether 
we ought to put much faith in the evidence of a people who, 
in spite of the sermons of Moses, were stupid enough to 
believe that a calf was their God ! Without dwelling on 
the reveries of a people cradled in bondage and brought up 
in absurdity, it is sufficient to remark, that ignorance has 
produced a belief in all the impostures and errors which 
prevail amongst us at the present day. 



Chap. II. 



ON THE REASONS WHICH HAVE LED MANKIND TO 
BELIEVE IN A DIVINITY. 

^ 1. 

Those who are ignorant of physical causes have a natu- 
ral fear*, proceeding from a restlessness in their minds, as 

• Genesis, chap iv, v. 7. 
I I. Samuel chap, xv, v. 11 t Jeremiah, chap, xviii, v. 10. 
II Caetera, quae fieri in terris, Ca3loque tuentiir 
Morlales pavidirf cum pendent mentibussaepe 
Efficiunt auiuios humilesformidine Divuni, 
Depressosque premunt ad terram. propterca quod 
Ignorantia cauearum conferre Deorum 



39 

to whether there exists a Being or an Agency invisible to 
them, who has the power to injure them or to do them good. 
Hence the tendency which they have to feign unseen causes, 
which are only the phantoms of their imagination — whom 
they deprecate in adversity and thank in prosperity. They 
make Gods of them for this purpose ; and this chimerical 
fear of invisible Powers is the source of those Religions 
which every one forms after his own fashion. Those whose 
interest it is that the people should rest contentedly fettered 
by such reveries, have fostered their spread — have founded 
laws upon them — and finally reduced the people by the ter- 
rors of futujrity to a blind obedience. 

§2. 

The origin of the Gods being discovered, men next ima- 
gined that they resembled themselves, and that they inva- 
riably acted with a certain end in vievv. Thus they unani- 
moiTsly said and believed, that God only works for man's 
behoof; and reciprocally, that man is only created for God. 
This prejudice is general even in the present day, and whea 
we reflect on the influence which it must necessarily have 
on the manners and opinions of men we may clearly per- 
ceive that from it have arisen those false ideas \vhich mea 
have formed to themselves, of good and evil, of merit 
and demerit, of praise and blame, of order xind confusion, 
of beauty and deformity, and a thousand other similar mat- 
ters. 

It must be agreed that all men are in a state of profound 
ignorance at their birth, and that their only natural wish is 
to seek that which is pleasant and profitable to them. — 
Hence it follows, 1st, That they believe it sufficient fi^r them 
that they are free, and that they feel within themselves the 
power of volition and desire, without troubling themselves 
as to the causes which effect this volition and this desire ; 
because they know them not. 2dly, As men only aim at 

Cogit ad imperium res, et concedere regnum : et 
Quorum operum causas uulla ratione videre 
Possunt haBC fieri Divino numine rentur. 

Lucret. de Rer, Nat. Lib. VI. v. 49 tt seq. 



40 

one object when they prefer it to all others, they sought to 
ascertain the final causes of their actions, imagining that 
after these were discovered there would be liitle room for 
doubt; and as they found within themselves and without 
themselves abundant means of arriving at the end proposed 
— the eye constructed for vision, the ear for hearing; a 
sun above them to give them light and heat ; they concluded 
that there was nothing in nature which was not made for them 
and which they could not enjoy and dispose of ; but as they 
well knew that they were not the creators of these things, 
they thought thlt they were justified in imagining a Supreme 
Being, the author of all; in one word they eoficeived that 
everything in existence was the work of one, or of more 
Divinities. On the other hand, the nature of the Gods whom 
men acknowledged being unknown to them, they believed 
that they were susceptible of like passions with themselves ; 
and as the natural dispositions of men are different, y'ery 
one rendered to his Divinity a worship according to his 
fancy, with the view of drawing down his blessings, and 
making universal nature subservient to his own desires. 

M- 

In this manner prejudice was changed into superstition. 
It was rooted in such a way that the most ignorant people 
believed themselves capable of explaining the doctrine of 
Jinal causes, as if they had an entire knowledge of them. — 
Thus, instead of proving that Nature did nothing in vain, 
they imagined that God and Nature thought after the man- 
/^er of men. Experience taught them that an infinite num- 
ber of calamities disturbed the pleasures of life — storms, 
earthquakes, plagues, hunger, thirst, &c. They attributed 
all these evils to divine wrath, and believed that the Deity 
was irritated against mankind for their offences ; nor could 
the daily occurring examples which prove that good and 
evil happen alike to the just and unjust, disabuse them of 
their prejudices. This error prevailed, because they found 
it easier to remain in their natural ignorance, than to divest 
themselves of notions established for so many ages ; and to 
adopt something in their stead, having at least the appear- 
ance of truth. 



41 



^5. 

This prejudice conducted them straightway to another, 
which was, that all the judgments of God were incompre- 
hensible ; and that conseqently ihey where beyond the cog- 
nizance of truth, and above the strength of human reason ; 
a mistake which would have existed at the present day, if 
mathematical knowledge, natural philosophy, and other sci- 
ences had not extinguished it. 

There is no necessity for a long dissertation to prove that 
nature never aims at any definite end, and that all these 
final causes are only human fictions. It is sufficient to 
show that this doctrine depW^^es the Deity of all the perfec- 
tions which have been attributed to him ] and this we will 
endeavor to da. 

If God acts for an end, either for himself or for any other 
being, he desires that which he does not possess ; and it 
must be granted from these premises that, as there was a 
Ume when God had no object for which to act, he wished 
to have one ; that is to say, that he stood in need of some- 
thing. But not to overlook anything which may strengthen 
the arguments of those who maintain the opposite opinion, 
suppose, for a moment, that a stone detached from a battle- 
ment fell upon an individual and killed him ; it proves, say 
our opponents, that this stone fell for the purpose of killing 
this person, because it could not so have happened unless 
God had wished it. If we reply that it was the wind which 
caused its fall at the time when the unfortunate individual 
was passing, they demand at once, how it happened that ho 
was passing exactly at the time when the wind brought 
down the stone. We answer, that he was on his way to 
dine with a friend who had invited him ; they wish to know 
why his friend had invited him on that day rather than on 
any other. They put in this manner an infinitude of ab- 
surd questions to force you to confess that the will of God 
alone (which is the refuge of the ignorant) was the real 
cause of the fall of this stone. When they examine the 
structure of the human body, they fall into ecstacies ; but 
because they are ignorant of the causes of those effects 

d4 



42 

which appear to them so marvellous, they conclude that it 
must be a supernatural effect, when the causes which are 
known to us account for it. This is the reason why the 
man who wishes deeply to examine the works of creation, 
and like a true philosopher to penetrate into their natural 
causes, irrespective of those prejudices which ignorance has 
created, is branded as an infidel, or speedily clamoured down 
by the malice of those whom the vulgar acknowledge as the 
interpreters of Nature and of the Gods. These mercenary 
spirits are well aware that the ignorance which holds the 
people in wonderment, is that which gives them bread,, and 
upholds, thei^ credit. 

Men being thus imbued with the ridiculous opinion that 
every thing which they behold is created for themselves, 
have made it a point of religion to engross every thing, and 
to judge of its value by the profit whiph it brings. Accor- 
dingly they have invented notions which do them service in 
explaining the nature of things, and enable them to judge of 
good and evil, order and disorder, heat and cold, beauty and 
ugliness, &c. which are by no means w^hat they imagine. 
Because they are able to frame their ideas in this way, they 
think that they are in a position to judge of praise and blame ; 
of good and evil. They call that good which respects their 
divine worship, and turns to their own profit ; and that which 
does neither the one nor the other they denominate evil ; 
and because the ignorant are incapable of judging, and have 
no conception of any thing save through the medium of their 
imagination, which they mistake for judgment, they tell us 
that nothing can be learned from nature, and forthwith invent 
a particular arrangement of the world. In short they think 
that matters are ill or well constituted according to the fa- 
cility or the difficulty which they have in conceiving of them 
when presented to them through the medium of their senses. 
People are best pleased with what gives least fatigue to the 
brain. These individuals have wisely resolved to prefer 
order to confusion, as if order were any thing else than a 
pure fiction of the imagination Thus to say that the Deity 
has made every thing with order, is to pretend that it is in 
favour of the human imagination that he has created the 






4^ 

world in a manner the most easy for it to form a conception' 
of; — or, which is the same thing, that they know with 
certainty all' the relations and all the designs of what-*- 
ever exists ; an assertion too absurd to merit any serious 
refutation. 

With respect to their other opinions, they are purely the 
result of this same imagination, having no basis in reality,, 
and being only different modifications of which that faculty 
is susceptible. Thus, when the impressions made upon the 
nervous system through the medium of the eyes are agree- 
able, they pronounce that the objects viewed are beautiful. 
Smells are good or bad ; tastes are sweet or bitter, things 
touched are hard or soft, according as the sensation produced 
is unpleasant or otherwise — as scents, and tastes, and con- 
tact, and sounds affect the system. Following up these 
ideas, men have believed that the Deity is pleased with melo- 
dy, while others have believed that all the movements of the 
celestial bodies were one harmonious concert; a proof, that 
these men are persuaded that things are really such as they 
conceive them to be, or that the world is entirely ideal. — 
It is not to be wondered at therefore, if we scarcely ever 
meet with two individuals of the same opinion : indeed 
some make it their boast to doubt of every thing ; for, al- 
though aU men have a similar bodily conformation, and 
resemble each other in many respects, there are still as 
many respects ia which they differ. Accordingly it must 
foUbw, that what pleases this party displeases that ; and 
what appears good to one man appears evil to another. — 
We must conclude therefore, that their various opinions 
must be attributed to their different organizations and the 
diversity of their co-existences — that reason has little con- 
nexion with them ; and in short, that their conceptions of 
the material world are the decided results of imagination. 

It is therefore evident, that all the reasonings which the 
generality of mankind are accustomed to employ when 
they set themselves to explain what nature is, are only their 
own modes of imagining that which is most luicakulated 



44 

to make good their own position. They give names to 
their ideas, as if they existed in any other quarter than in 
their own prejudiced brain ; but instead of calling them 
mere chimeras, they designate them Beings. There is 
extremely little difficulty in refuting the arguments ground- 
ed on such opinions. 

If it is true, as they advance, that the universe is nothing 
more than an emanation from, or simply a necessary con- 
sequence to, the Divine nature, whence spring those im- 
perfections and defaults which we perceive in it ? This 
objection is easily answered. It is impossible for men to 
judge of the perfection or imperfection of any Being, with- 
out a thorough knowledge of his nature and essence*, and 
it is a strange abuse of terms to assert that any thing is 
more or less perfect according as it pleases or di&pleases, 
or as it is useful or noxious to human nature. To termi- 
nate the argument with those who demand why God has 
not created all men good and happy, it is sufficient to state 
that every thing is necessarily what it is ; and that, in na- 
ture there is no imperfection, since all flows from the ne- 
cessity of things. 

§ la 

This being established, if it ig asked, "What then is 
God ?" I answer that the word imports that universal Being 
" in whom," as St. Paul says, " we live, and move, and 
have our being. f" This opinion conveys no unworthy no- 
tions of the Divinity, for if all things are in God, all things 
must necessarily flow from his essence, and consequently 
be of such essence as he himself; for it is impossible to 
conceive that beings entirely material should be maintained 
and comprehended in a Being who is not so. This opin- 
ion is not new. Tertullian, one of the most learned of the 
Christian fathers, maintained in his discourse against Ap- 
pelles, that whatever is not corporeal is nothing ; and in 

* " What appears to our limited conceptions to be evil or apparently 
unjust, is entirely owing to our having no commensurate ideas either 
of the goodness or the justice of the Deity." — Bolingbroke's Works, 
Vol. iv, p. 117,— Translator's Note. 

t Acta, chap, xvii, v. 28. 



m. 



45 

that against Praxeas that every Existence is a body. He 
adds, '* who will deny that God is a body, ahhough God is 
a Spirit* ?" It is of importance to observe that this doc- 
trine was not condemned in any of the four first CEcume* 
nical or General Councils of the Christian Church. f 

Ml. 

These ideas are clear and simple, and the only ones 
which an unbiassed mind can form of God. However, 
there are few contented with this simplicity. A gross peo- 
ple accustomed to the gratification of their senses, have 
conceived that God resembles tlie kings of the enrth. That 
pomp and splendor which surround the latter have dazzled 
them so much, that to uproot the idea that God has no re- 
semblance whatever to earthly sovereigns, would be to de- 
prive them of the hope of meeting celestial courtiers, and 
of enjoying in their company, the same pleasures which 
they had tasted at regnl courts ; it would take from them 
the only consolation which keeps them from despair amidst 
the miseries of this life. They assert that God must be a 
just and avenging Being who punishes and recompenses — 
they represent him as susceptible of every human passion 
— they depict him with feet, with hands, with eyes and 
with ears, and yet maintain that he is an immaterial Being. 
They quote Scripture to prove that man is chief of God's 
works below, and formed in his own image ; and deny that 
the copy has the slightest resemblance to the original. In 
short, the God of the people in the present day, as repre- 
sented by themselves, is subject to more transformations- 
than the Pagan Jupiter. What is still more strange is this, 
that the more these opinions contradict each other and out- 
rage common sense, the more are they revered by the vul- 

* **Quiautem negabit Deum esse corpus, etsi Deus Spirilus?" Tertul 
a<3v. Prax. cap. vii. 

t These four Councils were, First, that of Nice, (325) under Con- 
slantine and Pope Sylvester: Second, that of Constaminople, 381, 
under Gratian, Valentinian, Theodosius, and Pope Damasus: Third, 
that ofEphesus, 431, under Tlieodosius II, Valentinian, and Pope Cel- 
esiin : and Fourth, that of Chalcedoa, 451, under Valentinian, Marcia- 
nu8, and Pope Leo 1. 



46 

gar, who uphold with bigotry whatever their prophets have 
enounced, ahhough these visionaries only held the same 
place among the Hebrews, as did the augurs and soothsay- 
ers amongst the pagans. They consult the Bible as if God 
and Nature had explained it to theni exclusively, although 
it is only a tissue of fragments gcUhered together at various 
periods, and by different persons, and published under the 
censorship of the Rabbis * Tiiese, at iheir pleasure, de- 
cided as to what ought to be approved of, and what reject- 
ed ; according as they found u agreeable or opposed to the 
law of Moses. 

Such is the malice and the folly of maid\.ind. They 
spend their lives in quibbles, and persist in reverencing a 
book which has scarcely more arrangement than the Alco- 
ran of Mahomet — a book which from its obscurity nobody 
understarids, and which has only served to foment divisions. 
The Jew and Christians love far better to consult this leg- 
erdemain book, than to listen to that which God, that is to 
say Nature (inasmuch as it is the origin of all things) has 
written on their hearts. Ail other laws are merely humaa 
figments — palpable illnsions set abroad, not by demons or 
evil sj)irits, which are the creations of tiie fancy, but by the 
policy of princes, and ttie craft of priests. The former 
have striven in this way to add weight to their authority ; 
and the latter have been cof.tented to enrich themselves by 
'J;o sale of an infinitude of c-himerical notions, which they 
vend at a dear rate to their io^riorant (bllowers. 

No other code of laws which has follovvo?! that of Moses, 
except the Christian, has been based upon that Bible the 
original of which could never be discovered, which relates 
to thirjgs supernatural and impossible, and which speaks of 
rewards and punishments for actions good or bad, but wise- 

* The Talmud inrorms us that the Rabbis deliberated whether they 
ought not to strika froii) the list of (Canonical writings the hooks of Pro- 
verbs and Ecclesiastes, and tliat ihey only spared them because they 
made favourab'e mention of Moses and his law The prophecies of 
Ezekiel Cwhich the Jews were not permitted to read until they were 
thirty years of age^ would to a certainly have been expunged from the 
sacred Catalogue, if a learned Rabbi had not undertaken to reconcile 
theti) with the siime ^.aw. 



47 

]y postpones them till an after life, lest the imposture should 
be detected ; for no one has ever returned from the grave. 
Thus the people, kept always fluctuating between hope and 
fear, are held in bondage by the belief that Uod has creat- 
ed mankind for no other purpose than that of rendering 
them eternally happy or everlastingly miserable. This is 
the origin of the vast number of religions which prevail in 
the world. 



CHAP. III. 

ON THE MEANING OF THE WORD RELIGON ; HOW, AND 
FOR WHAT PURPOSE, SO MANY RELIGIONS HAVE BEEN 
INTRODUCED INTO THE WORLD. ^ 

§ 1. 

Before^ihe term Religion was introduced into the world, 
mankind followed the law of Nature, that is, they lived 
conformably to Reason. 'Instinct was the only bond by 
which men were united ; and this bond, simple as it is, 
was so strong that divisions were rare. But after terror 
led them to suspect that there w^ere Gods and invisible 
Powers, tliey built altars to the imaginary beings, and 
shaking off the yoke of reason and of Nature, they bended 
themselves by foolish ceremonies, and by a superstitious 
Avorship of the idle phantoms which themselves had 
imagined. 

Such was the origin of the word Religion, which has 
made so much noise in the world. After having admitted 
the existence of these invisible Agencies, men worshipped 
them to depreciate their anger, and moreover they believed 
that nature was under the control of these Powers. After- 
wards they came to regard themselves as inert matter, or 
as slaves who could only act under the commands of these 
imaginary beings. This false idea having obtained possess- 
ion of their minds, they began to exhibit more contempt for 
nature, and more respect for those whom they called their 
Gods. Hence sprung that ignorance in which so many 
nations were immersed — an ignorance from which, however 
profound, the true philosophers might have freed them, if 



48 

tiiey liad not been alw-ays thwarted by those who led the 
blind, and throve by their own impostures. 

Now, although there were little appearance of success 
in our undertaking, we must not forsake the cause of truth. 
A generous mind will speak of things as they really are, 
out of regard to those who exhibit symptoms of this malady. 
The truth, whatever its nature may be, can never be in- 
jurious ; whereas error, although at the time apparently 
innocent and even useful, must finally terminate in the most 
disastrous results. 

Terror having thus created the Gods, men wished to 
ascertain their nature, and conceivinof that they must be 
of the same substance as the Soul, which they thought was 
like the appearances in a mirror, or the phantoms of sleep, 
they believed that their Gods were real substances, but 
so thin and subtle that to distinguish them from Bodies 
they named them Spirits ; although Bodies and Spirits are 
in truth one and the same thing, for it is impossible to 
imagine an incorporeal Spirit. Every, spirit has its proper 
shape, which is inclosed in some body ; that is, it has its 
limits, and consequently^ it is a body, however subtle its 
nature-.* 

M- ^ 

The ignorant, that is the majority of mankind, having 
thus determined the nature and substance of their Gods, 
endeavoured next to discover the means by which these in- 
visible agents acted ; and unable to arrive at this because of 
their ignorance, th«y had recourse to their own conjectures, 
judging blindly of the future from the past. How is it possi- 
ble to draw rational conclusi<3ns from any thing which has 
formerly happened in a certain way, as to what will happen 
hereufter, seeing that all the circumstances and all the cau- 
ses which necessarily influence events and human actions, 
are so exceedingly different. They persisted however ia 
contemplating the past, and they augured well or ill as to 
the future, according as any former similar undertaking 
had been successful or otherwise. On this principle, be- 

* Consult Hobbes^ Leviathan '* De Homine," chap, xli, pages 56, 
67 and 58. 



49 

taiise niormis had defeated the Lacedemonians at the bat- 
tle of Naiipactus, the Athenians, after his death appointed 
another commander of the same name. Hannibal having 
been conquered by Scipio Mricanus, the Romans, on 
account of his success, sent to the same province, Scipio 
Caesar, who was unsuccessful both against the Greeks* 
and the native forces. Thus have many nations, after 
two or three experiments, only attributed their bad or 
good fortune to places, to objects, and to names. Others 
employed certain words which they denominated spells^ 
which they considered efficacious enough to make trees 
speak, to create a man or a God from a morsel of bread, and 
in short to metamorphose wliatever appeared before their 
«yes.t 

^ 4. 

The empire of these invisible powers being now estab- 
lished, men at first did homage to them as their sovereigns, 
by marks of submission and respect ; by gifts, prayers, Slc, 
I say, at first, for nature does not enjoin bloody sacrifices 
for this purpose ; these were only instituted for the subsis- 
tence of priests, and others set apart for the services of these 
imaginary Gods. 

k 5. 

These originators of Religion, viz. Hope and Fear, 
aided by the different opinions and passions of men, have 
given rise to a vast number of phantastical creeds, which 
have been the cause of so much mischief and of so many 
revolutions among the nations. 

The honor and the revenues attached to the priesthood, 
or to the ministers of th« Gods, have encouraged the 
ambition and avarice of cunning men who knew how to 
profit by the stupidity of the vulgar, whom they have got 

* Philip of Macedon h)d Rent auxilinries and money to Hannibal 
in Africa. "Infensos Philippo, ob auxilia cum pecunia nuper iu 
Africam missu Anuibale." Levy, Book xxxi. chap. 1. — Translator s 
Note. 

t Hobbe'fi L*?viathan, " De Homine," chap, xii, pp. .56 and 57. 

5 



50 

so much entangled in their snares that they have led them 
insensibly into the habit of loving a lie and hating the 
truth. 

A system of falsehood being established, ambitious men, 
intoxicated with the pleasure of being elevated above their 
fellow mortals, attempted to add to lleir reputation by feign- 
ing that they were the friends of those invisible Beings 
whom the common people so much feared. The better to 
succeed in this eveiy one represented them after his fash- 
ion, and they all took ihe liberty of multiplying them to an 
extent almost incredible. 

§ 7. 

The rude unformed matter of the world was called the 
God Chaos. In the same way they deified the Heavens, 
the Earth, the Sea, Fire, the Winds and Planets. 
The same honor v/as conferred on men and women ; birds, 
reptiles, the crocodile, the calf, the dog, the lamb, the ser- 
pent and the swine, in fact, all sorts of plants and animals 
were worshipped. Every river, every fountain, bore the 
name of some deity ; every house had its lares and peimtes, 
and every man his genius — all was filled above and be- 
low the earth with Gods, Spirits, Shadows, and Demons. 
Neither was it enough to feign divinities in every imagina- 
ble place. They outrage in the same way, Time, the 
Day, the Night, Victory, Strife, Honor, Virtue, Health, and 
Sickness. They invented these Divinities that they might 
represent them as ready to take vengeance on those who 
would not be brought up in temples and at altars. Lastly, 
they took to worshipping their own Genii ; some invoked 
their's under the name of the Muses, while others, under 
that of Fortune, worshipped their owm ignorance. Some 
sanctioned their licentiousness under the name of Cupid, 
their wrath under that of the Furies, their natural parts under 
the nome of Priopus ; in one w^ord there was nothing to 
which they did not give the name of a God or a Demon. 

§ 8. 

The founders of these Religions, knowing well that their 
impostures were based upon the ignorance of the people, 



51 

took care to keep them in it by the adoration of images irt 
which they feigned that the Divinities resided. This rain- 
ed gold into the coffers of the priesthood, and their benefices- 
were considered as sacred things because they belonged to 
feoly ministers; no one having the rashness or audacity to 
aspire totfiem. The better to deceive mankind, the priests 
pretended to be divinely inspired Prophets, capable of pene- 
trating the mvsteries of futurity, boasting that they ha^l in- 
tercourse with the Gods; and, as the desire is natural 
to learn one's destiny, they by no means failed to take ad- 
vantage of it. Some were established at Delos, others at 
Delphi, and in various places, wherein ambiguous language 
they answered the questions put to them. Even women 
took a part in these impostures^ and the Romans in their 
greatest difficulties consulted the Sybilline books. These 
knaves were really considered inspired. 'i'hose who 
feio:ne(l that they had familiar commerce with the dead were 
called Necromancers ; others pretended to ascertain the 
future from the flight of l)irds or the enirails of beasts; in 
short they could draw a good or bad augury from almost 
every thing, the eyes, the bands, the countenance, or any 
extraordinary object. So true it is that ignorance will re- 
ceive any impression, when men know how to take advan- 
tage of it.* 

§ 9. 

The ambitious, who have always been great masters in the 
art of deceiving, have followed this method in promulgating 
their laws ; and to induce mankind to give a voluntary sub- 
mission to them, they have pursuaded them that they re- 
ceived them from some God or Goddess. 

However great the multitude of Divinities, amongst 
those who worshipped them, and who were denominated 
Pagans, there vi^as never arjy generally established system 
of religion. Every republic, every kingdom, every city, 
and every individual had their own proper riles, and 
conceived of the Divinity after their own phantasy. But 
afterwards there arose legislatures more subtle than the 
former, and who employed more skilful and sure plans in 
giving forth the laws, the worship, and the ceremonies cal- 

* Hobbes, ubi supra *' De Homine." chap. xii. pages 58 and 59 



52 

culated to noiuish that fanaticism which it was their object 
to establish. 

Amongst a great number, Asia has produced three, 
distinguished as much by their laws and the worship which 
they established, as- by the ideas which they have given of 
the Divinity, and tke methods which they employed to 
confirm these ideas, and to render their laws sacred. — 
Moses was the most ancient. After him Jesus (.Christ ap- 
peared, who wrought upon his plan and kept the fundamen- 
tal portion of his laws, but abolished the remainder. Ma- 
homet, who appeared the last upon the scene, borrowed 
from each of the Religions in order to compose his own, 
and thereafter declared himself the sworn enemy of both. — 
We shall consider the char*acter of the three legislators, and 
examine their conduct, that afterwards we may be enabled 
to decide whose opinions are best grounded — those who 
reverence them as inspired men, or those wlio regard the oi 
as impostors. 

f 10. 

MOSES. 

The celebrated Moses, a grandson of a dfstinguished 
Magician,* (according to Justin Martyr) possessed every ad- 
vantage calculated to render him that which he finally be- 
came. It is well known that the Hebrews, of whom ho 
became the chief, were a nation of shepherds whom Pharaoh 
Osiris I. admitted into his kingdom in gratitude for the 
services which one of them had rendered during a period 
of severe famine. He assigned them a territory in the 
East of Egypt, rich in pasturage, and admirably adapted 
for the rearing of cattle ; where, during two centuries, they 
very much increased in numbers, either, that being regard- 
ed as strangers they were not liable to military service, or 
on account of the other privileges which Osiris had coa- 
ferred upon them. Many natives of the country joined 

♦ This word must not be taken in its usual acceptation. What 
rational men understand by the term is a dexterous man, an able cheats 
and a master of jugglery, which requires great readiness and address;, 
and not by any means a person in compact with the Devil as the vulgag? 
suppose* 



53 

themselves to them, among others, bands of Arabs who re- 
garded them as brethren and of the same origin. However 
this may be, they multiplied so exceedingly, that the land of 
Goshen being unable to contain them, they spread over all 
the land of Egypt ; giving just occasion to Pharaoh to 
dread that they would undertake some dangerous enter- 
prise if his kingdom were attacked by the Ethiopians, his 
inveterate enemies, as had frequently happened. Reasons 
of state, therefore, compelled this monarch to take away 
their privileges, and to devise some means of weakening 
them and keeping them in subjection. 

Pharaoh Orus, surnamed Busirus on account of his 
cruelty, succeeded Memnon, and followed up his plans with 
respect to the Hebrews; and wishing to eternalize his 
memory by building the Pyramids, and fortifying the walls 
of Thebes, condemned the Hebrews to the task of making 
bfficks, for which purpose the earth of that country was well 
adapted. During their bondage the celebrated Moses was 
born, the same year in which the king commanded that all 
the male Hebrew children should be thrown into the Nile, 
as- the surest method of ridding his country from this host 
of strangers. Moses was in this way exposed to perish in 
the waters, his mother having placed him in a wicker basket 
among the willows on the banks of the stream. It happen^ 
ed that Thesmutis, the daughter of the king^ was walldng 
by the river, w^hen, hearing the cries of the infant, that 
compassion so natural to her sex, inspired her with a wish 
ta save it. Orus being dead she succeeded him, and Moses 
having been presented to her she commanded that he should 
receive the highest instruction which could be procured, as 
a son of the Queen of a people at that time the most learned 
and civilized in the world. " He w^as learned in all the 
learning of the Egyptians." This implies that he was the 
ablest Politician, the greatest philosopher, and the most dis- 
tinguished Magician of his time ; and besides,, it is very 
evident that he had been initiated into the Egyptian Priest- 
hood, which resembled those of the Druids among the Gauls. 
Tho&e who are ignorant of the nature of the Egyptian 
government, must learn that the whole territory was subject 
to one sole sovereign, but that it was divided into many 
provinces of but limited extent. The governors of these 

5e 



54 

provinces were designated Monarchs, and were generally 
of the powerful order of the Priesthood, which in fact pos- 
sessed almost the third part of Egypt. The king nomina- 
ted these Monarchs ; and if we compare what others 
have written concerning Moses, and what he has writ- 
ten himself, we must conclude that he was Monarch of the 
Province of Goshen, and that he owed his appointment to 
Thesmutis, to. whom also he owed his life. Such was the 
status of Moses amongst the Egyptians, where he had full, 
time and every opportunity of studying their manners and 
those of his own nation, and of obtaining a knowledge of 
thier dominant inclinations and passions ; a knowledge, of 
which he failed not to avail himself in that revolution of 
which he was the originator. 

After the death of Thesmutis, her successor renewed the 
persecution against the Hebrews, and Moses having fallen 
from the honor in which he had been formerly held, was 
afraid that he would find it difficult to justify a homicide 
of which he had been guilty. He accordingjy resolved on 
flight, and retired into Arabia Petrea. Chance led him ta 
the house of the chief of some native tribe, to whom ho 
rendered so many services, and by whom his talents were 
so highly appreciated that he gave him one of his daugh- 
ters in marriage. It must here be remarked that Moses 
was so little of a Jew, and had so limited a conception of 
the Deity whom he afterwards imagined, that he married 
an idolatress, and did not even think of circumcising his 
children. 

It was in the Arabian deserts, when watching the flocks 
of his father-in-law. that he formed the design of taking 
vengeance upon the King of Egypt for the injuries he had 
met with. He flattered himself that he would easily 
succeed in this, as well on account of his own talents, 
as from the feeling which he kn^w was general amongst 
those of his- own nation, irritated against the government 
on account of the cruel treatment which they had experi- 
enced. 

It appeal's from the history which he has left us of this 
revolution, or at all events, from the history which the au- 
thor of the books attributed to Moses, has left us, that Jethro» 
his father-in-law, was in the plot, as were Aaron.his brothr 



®T,. aiid sister Marion, wba remained in Egypt, and with 
whom, no doubt, he maintained a correspondence. 

However that may be, we perceive from the result, that 
he:^had with the utmost policy schemed out a great design ; 
and that he knew how to bring to bear against the Egyp- 
tians that learning which he had acquired amongst them, 
I allude to magic, in the exhibition of w^hich he showed 
himself more subtle and expert than all those who attempted 
the same tricks at the court of Pharaoh. 

It was by these pretended prodigies that he gained over 
those of his nation whom he wished to carry off, and to 
whom disaffected and revolutionary Egyptians, Ethiopians 
and Arabs joined themselves. By boasting the power of 
his Divinity, and the frequent communions which he had 
with him ;. and by declaring that he had his sanction for 
all the steps which he took with the leaders of the revolu- 
tion, he succeeded so v/ell that there followed him 600,000 
fighting men, besides women and children, across the Ara- 
bian deserts, of which he w^ell knew the localities. After 
six days painful flight, he ordained to his followers that 
they should consecrate the seventh day to his God by a 
general and public rest, for the purpose of persuading them 
that the Deity favored him and approved of his authority ; 
and to deter any one from having the audacity to dispute his 
statements. 

There never existed a more ignorant people than the 
Hebrews, nor consequently more credulous. To be assur- 
ed of this we have only to look to their condition in Egypt 
when Moses caused them to revolt. They were detested 
by the Egyptians on account of their profession as shep. 
herds, they were persecuted by the sovereign, and employed 
in the most degrading toil. Amongst a people thus situated 
it could not be very difficult for a man with the abilities of 
Moses to exercise a vast influence. He persuaded them 
that his God, (whom he sometimes merely styles an angel), 
the God of their fathers, had appeared to him — that it was 
at his command that he had taken them under his guidance 
— and that they would be a people highly favored of the 
Deity, provided they believed in him. The expert employ- 
ment of deceit, and his knowledge of science, attd of hur 
man nature, fortified his injunctions ;. and he sirengthened his 



56^ 

position by prodigies^ which are always sure to make a 
deep impression on the minds of an imbecile populace. 

It must here be attended to with especial care, that he 
thought he had discovered a sure method of keeping the 
Hebrews in subjection to himself, by persuading them that 
God himself was their conductor— that he preceded them by 
night as a pillar of fire, and by day as a cloud. It can be 
proved that this is perhaps a more gross deceit on the 
part of this leader than any he had ever practised. Dur- 
ing his sojourn in Arabia, he had learned that, as the country 
was of vast extent and uninhabited, it was the custom of 
those who travelled in caravans to take guides, who^ con- 
ducted them under night by meana of a brasier filled with' 
burning wood, the flame of which they followed ; and the 
smoke of which by day equally prevented the parties of 
the caravan from straggling. Moses took advantage of this 
and proclaimed it miraculous, adducing it as an evidence 
of divine protection. No person is called upon to regard 
this as cheat, on my authority ; let them believe Moses 
himself, who in the book of Numbers, chap, x, v. 31, is 
represented as beseeching his brother-in-law Habab to= 
journey with the Israelites and show them the way, because 
he knew the country J^ This is proof positive. If it were 
really God who went before the people of Israel by night 
and by day, as a pillar of cloud and of lire, could they have 
desired a better guide ? Notwithstanding here is this 
leader entreating his brother-in-law in the most urgeni 
manner to act as his guide ; the pillar of cloud and fire, 
it would seem, being only a God for the people and not for 
Moses. 

The unfortunate dupes being delighted to find themselves 
adopted by the chief of the Gods on their escape fi-om a? 
cruel bondage, cheerfully put faith in Moses, and swore 
to obey him blindly. His authority being confirmed, he 
wished to render it perpetual ; and under the spacious 
pretext of establishing the worship of that God whose 
"Vicegerent he said he was, he appointed at once his brother- 

*" And he said. Leave us not,! pray thee; for as much asthou- 
knowest how we are to encamp in the wilderness, and thou muyestbeta 
US instead of eyes.^^ — Num. cha^. x, v. 31.. 



5-7 

and his sons to high authority in the Royal Palace, that i^ 
the place whence he thought proper to give forth his oracies ;, 
this place beinij altogether out of the view of the people^. 
Lastly he practised that which is always done at the for- 
mation of new institutions ; that is, he exhibited prodiyies^. 
miracles, whereby some were dazzled, and othe.rs confoun- 
ded, but w^iich only excited pity in those who could see 
through his impostures-. 

However crafty Moses might have been, he would have 
had considerable difficulty in securing obedience, vvithou! the 
aid of his armed followers. An impostor without, pliysical 
force rarely succeeds. 

But in spite of the great nunvber of dupes who submitted 
themselves blindly to the will of this clever [jeglslator, there 
were found people bold enough to reproach him f(»r ba'l faith ; 
declaring that, under false appeararjces of justice and equal- 
ity, he had engrossed the whole — that tlie sovereigti author- 
ity was confined to his own fatniiy, who had no more right 
to it than any other individuals — and that he was less the 
father than the tyrant of his people. But on these occasions 
Moses, with profourul policy, put to death those daring spirits 
and spared no one who disputed his authority. 

It was by similar precautions, and by always declaring 
that his punishments were instances of divine vengeance,. 
that he reigned an absolute despot ; and to end as he had 
begun — that is to say, as a knave and an impostor — he was 
in the habit of retiring to a cave, which he had caused ta 
be dug in the centre of a waste, under the pretext of having 
conferences with the Divinity, that he might secure in this 
\yay the respect and submission of his followers. His 
end was like that of other similar impostors. He cast him- 
self from a precipice which he knew of in the remote wil- 
derness, to the end that his body might not be discovered, 
and that it might be thought the Deiiy had carried him off. 
He was not ignorant that tlie memory of the patriarchs which 
had preceded him was held in great veneration, although 
they knew their sepulchres ; but this was not eru)ugh for 
an ambition like his — it was necessary that he shoidd be 
revered as a god, over whom death had no control. This 
is the explanation of what he said at the commencement of 
iiis reign, when he said that God had declared that he was 



58 

to be a God unto his hrother.* Elijah in like manner, and 
Romuhis,! and Zamolxis, and all those who have had the 
foolish vanity to wish to eternalise their names, have con- 
cealed the time and manner of their death, in order that 
they might be thought immortal. 

^11. 

But to return to the legislators. There have never beea 
any who did not assert that their laws did not emanate from 
some divinities^, and who have not attempted to persuade 
their followers that they themselves were more than mor- 
tal. Numa Pompilius, after having tasted tlie sweets of 
retirement, was with difficulty persuaded to leave them, al- 
though it was to fill the throne of Romulus ; but compelled 
by the acclamations of the people, he profited by the devot* 
edness of the Romans, and insinuated to them that if they 
really wished him to be their king, they must be prepared 
to obey him without enquiry ,^ and to observe religiously the 
laws and divine institutions which had been comiuunicated 
to him by the goddess Egeria.||; 

Alexander the Great hadt no less vanity. Not content^ 
with seeing himself master of the world, he wished to per- 
suade mankind that he was the son of Jupiter. Perseus 
pretended also to have derived his origin from the same god 
and the virgin Darjae. Plato also insisted on a virgin na^ 
livity, regarding Apollo as his father. There have beea« 
many other personages who have been guilty of the same 
absurdity. No doubt all these great men believed in the 
opinion of the Egyptians, who nmintained that the Spirit of 
God was capable of having intercourse witrh the female sex,, 
and rendering them pregnant. 

* Exodus iv. 16. 

t VViien Romnhis was reviewing his forces in the plain of Caprae^ 
here suddenly arose a ^innder-.storui, dnring,^vvhich he was enveloped 
II so thick a cloud that he was lost to the view of his army; nor there* 
after on this earth was Romulus seen. — Liv. 1. I. c. 16. — Translator's 
note. 

X Hobhes' Leviathan ; de homine, chap. xii. pp. 59 and 60. 

II It is recorded by Livy, that" there is a grove, through which flow- 
«d a perenial streanj, taking^ its origin in a dark cave, in which Numa 



59 

JESUS CHRIST. 

Jesus Christ, who was acquainted with the maxims and 
the science of the Egyptians, gave currency to the belief 
alhided to above, because he thought it suitable to his pur* 
poses. Reflecting how Moses had become renowned by 
his command of an ignorant people, he undertook to build 
on this fonndation, and got some few imbecile people to 
follow him, whom he persuaded that the Holy Ghost was 
his father, and that his mother was a virgin. These simple 
folks, accustomed to give themselves over to dreams and 
reveries, adopted his opinions, and believed whatever he 
wished : indeed, something considerably beyond this rnira- 
culous birth would by no means have been too miraculous 
for them. A beautiful dove overshadowed a virgin : there 
is nothing surprising in that. It happened frequently in 
Lydia ; and the swan of Leda is the counterpart of the 
dove of Mary.* That a man should be born of a virgin, 
by the operation of the Holy Spirit, is neither more extra- 
ordinary nor more miraculous that that Genghis Khan should 
be born of a virgin, as the Tartars assert; or that Fob, ac- 
cording to the Chinese belief, derived his origin from a v'ir* 
gin rendered pregnant by the rays of the sun. 

This prodigy appeared at a time when the Jews, wearied 
with their God as they had formerly been with their Judg- 
es,! were desirous to have some visible ruler among them, 
as was the case with other nations. As the number of fools 
is infinite, Jesus Christ in a short time had many followers 5 
but as liis extreme poverty was an invincible obstacle to 

was accustomed to meet the goddess, and receive instructions as to bU 
political and religioiis institutions. — Liv. 1. I. c. 21. 

* Qu'tin beau Pigoon a tire d'aile 
Vienne obom brer line Pnrcelle, 
Rien n'esl sur prenant en cela ; 
L'on en vit autant en Lydie. 
Et le bem] Cygne de Leda 
Vant bien Ic Pigeon de Marie, 

1 1. Samuel, chap. viii. vs. 5 and 6, 



60 

Ms elevation, the Pharisees — at one time his admirers, ana 
at another time startled at his boldness — forwarded or 
thwarted liis interests, according to the inconstant humour 
t>f the populace. The report of his divine origin was spread 
about ; but without forces, as he was, it was impossible that 
he could succeed, although some cures which he perform- 
ed, and some resurrections from the dead to which he pre-- 
tended, brought him somewhat into repute. Without money 
or arms he could not fail to perish : >{{ he had been in pos» 
session of these, he would have been no less successful 
than Moses or Mahomet, and all those who, with like ad- 
vantages, have elevated themselves above their fellow-men. 
If he had been more unfortunate, he would not have been 
less adroit; and several traits in his history prove that the 
principal defect in his policy was his carelessi^ess in not 
sufficiently providing for his own security. Otherwise, I 
do not find that his plans were less skilfully devised than 
those of the other two : at all events his law has become 
the rule of faith to people who flatter themselves that they 

are the wisest in the world. 

m 

§ 13. 
On the Politics of Jesus Christ. 

Can anything be more subtle than the answer of Jesus 
concerning the woman taken in adultery ? The Jews hav- 
ing demanded of him if they should stone her, instead of 
answering the question directly— -a negative answer being 
directly contrary to the law, and an affirmative convicting 
him of severity and cruelty, which would have alienated 
their minds from him— instead, therefore, of replying as an 
ordinary individual would have done on the occasion — " Let 
him," said he, *' who is without sin amongst you cast the 
iirst stone at her.^^* A shrewd reply, and one evincing 
great presence of mind. On another occasion, being shown 
a piece of money with the emperor's image and superscrip- 
tion upon it, and asked if it were lawful to pay tribute mo- 
ney unto Cffisar, he eluded the difficulty of answering: 
*' Render unto Caesar the things which are Ci9esar's."t The 

♦ The Gospel according to John, chap. viii. v. 7. 
t Matthew's Gospel, chap. xxii. v. 21. 



61 

false position in which they wished to place him was this : 
that if he denied that it was lawful, he was guilty of high 
treason ; and if he said that it was, he went directly against 
the law of Moses, which he always protested that he never 
intended to do — knowing no doubt that he was too helpless 
to do so with impunity at that time. Afterwards, when he 
became more celebrated, he endeavoured to abrogate it al- 
most totally : acting in this way not unlike those princes, 
who, until their power is thoroughly established, always 
promise to confirm the privileges of their subjects, but who, 
after that has been secured, care little for their promises. 

When the Pharisees asked him by what authority he 
taught the people and preached to them, he penetrated their 
intention — which was to convict him of falsehood ; whether 
he answered that it was by human authority — he not being 
of the order of the priesthood, who alone were charged 
with the instruction of the people ; or whether he preach- 
ed by the express orders of God — his own doctrine being 
opposed to the law of iMoses ; he avoided their snare, and 
embarrassed themselves, by asking them in what name John 
baptised.* 

The Pharisees, who from political motives, rejected the 
baptism of John, would have condemned themselves if they 
had said that it was in the name of God ; and if they had 
not said so, they would have exposed themselves to the rage 
of the populace, who maintained the opposite opinion. To 
get out of this dilemma, they answered that they could not 
tell : on which Jesus Christ replied, that neither was he 
obliged to tell them by what name or authority he taught 
the people. 

§ 14. 

Such was the character of the destroyer of the ancient 
law, and the founder of the new religion that was built up- 
on its ruins ; in which religion a disinterested mind can 
perceive nothing more divine than in any of those which 
preceded it. Its founder, who was not altogether ignorant, 
having witnessed extreme corruption in the Jewish repub- 
lic, judged that its end was near, and thought it a favorable 
opportunity for forwarding his own designs. 

* Matthew's Gospel, chap. xxi. v- 27, 
F 



62 

The fear of being anticipated by men more able thart 
himself, made him hasten to secure his ground by means 
entirely opposite to those adopted by Moses. The former 
began by rendering himself terrible to other nations. Jesus 
Christ, on the contrary, attracted mankind to himself by the 
hope of blessings in a life beyond the grave, which he said 
they would obtain by believing in him. Whilst Moses on- 
ly promised temporal benefits to the observers of his law, 
Jesus Christ led his followers to hope for those which would 
never end. The laws of the one only regarded exterior 
observances ; those of the other looked into the heart, in- 
fluenced the thoughts, and stood on opposite grounds to the 
law of Moses. Whence it follows, that Jesus Christ be- 
lieved with Aristotle, that it is the same with religion and 
nations as with individuals who are born and who die ; and 
as there is nothing which is not subject to dissolution, there 
is no law which must not in turn give place to another.* 
But as there is difficulty in passing from one law to ano- 
ther, and as the greater part of men are stubborn in reli- 
gious matters, Jesus Christ, in imitation of other innovators, 
had recourse to miracles, which have at all times confound- 
ed the ignorant, and advanced the projects of ambitious 
and designing men. 

^ 15. 

Christianity having been founded in this way, Jesus Christ 
wisely imagined that he could profit by the errors in the 
politics of Moses, and render his new law eternal — an 
undertaking in which he finally succeeded a little perhaps 
beyond his expectation. The Hebrew prophets intended 
to do honour to Moses, by predicting a successor who should 
resemble him--a Messiah great in virtues, powerful in wealth, 
and terrible to his enemies. These prophecies, however, 
produced altogether a different effect from what they expect- 
ed ; a number of ambitious demagogues having embraced 
the opportuninty of palming themselves off for the coming 

* Saint Paul, Hebrews, chap. viii. v. 13 speaks in these terms: "In 
that he saith a new covenant, he hath made the first old Now that 
which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away." — Transla- 
tor's note. 



63 

Messiah, which led to those insurrections and civil convul- 
sions which lasted until the entire destruction of the ancient 
pepublic of the Hebrews. Jesus Christ, more subtle than 
the prophets who succeeded Moses, predicted that a man 
of this description would appear — the great enemy of God — 
the favorite of the demons — -the aggregation of all the vices 
and the cause of all the desolation in the world. After such 
a splendid eulogy, one would think that nobody could resist 
the temptation of calling himself Antichrist ; and I do not 
believe that it is possible to discover a secret equal to it for 
eternalizing a law, although there can be nothing more fab- 
ulous than what we read of concerning this pretended An- 
tichrist. St. Paul says that he was a ready born ; whence 
it follows that he must have been on the watch for the coming 
of Jesus Christ : nevertheless, more than sixteen years roll- 
ed on after the prediction of the nativity of this formidable 
personage, without any one having heard of his appearance. 
I acknowledge that some have applied the terms to Ebion 
and Cerinthus, two great adversaries of Jesus Christ, whose 
pretended divinity they disputed. But if this interpretation 
be the meaning of the Apostle, which is far from being cre- 
dible, the words referred to must point out a host of Anti- 
christs in all ages — it being impossible that truly learned 
men should think of injuring the cause of truth, by declaring 
that the history of Jesus Christ was a contemptible fable,* 
and that his law was nothing but a series of dreams and 
reveries, which ignorance had brought in repute, which self- 
interest had encouraged, and which tyranny had taken under 
its especial protection. 

§ 16. 

They pretend, nevertheless, that a religion built upon so 
weak foundations is divine and supernatural, as if it were 

* This was the opinion of Pope Leo X. as appears from an expres- 
sion of his, which, considering that it was made use of at a time when 
the philosophical spirit of inquiry had made little progress, was remark- 
ably bold. " It has been well known in all ages," he observed to Car- 
dinal Bembo, ** how much this fable of Jesus Christ has been profitable 
to us and ours." Quantum nobis nostrisque sa de Christo fabula pro- 
fuerit, satis est omnibus saeculis notutn. 



64 

not an ascertained fact that there is no class of people more 
fitted to give currency to the most absurd opinions than 
Women and lunatics. It is not to be wondered at that Jesus 
Christ reckoned none of the learned amongst his followers. 
He well knew that his law was inconsistent with common 
sense ; and therefore he always declaimed against the sages, 
excluding them from that kingdom into which he admitted 
the poor in spirit, the simple and the imbecile. Rational 
Hiinds ought to be thankful that they have nothing to do with 
such insanities. 

^ 17. 

On the Morality of Jesus Christ. 

We find nothing more divine in the morality of Jesus 
Christ than what can be drawn from the works of ancient 
authors ; for this reason, perhaps every text in his code of 
morals is either borrowed from their^s or is an imitation of it. 
St. Augustine* acknowledges that in one of the so-called 
heathen writers, he discovered the whole of the commence- 
ment pf the gospel according to St. John. We must remark 
also, that this apostle was so much accustomed to plunder 
others^ that he has not scrupled to pillage from the prophets 
their enigmas and visions, for the purpose of composing his 
Apocalypse. Again, whence arises that agreement between 
the doctrines of the Old and New Testament and those of 
Plato, unless the Rabbis and others who composed the 
Jewish Scriptures had stolen from that distinguished man. 
The account of the creation of the world given in his Ti- 
maeits, is much more satisfactory than that recorded in 
the book of Genesis ; and it will not do to say that Plato, 
in his tour through Egypt, had read the books of the Jews, 
since, by the confession of St. Augustine, king Ptolemy had 
not ordered them to be translated till long after the philoso- 
pher had left the country. 

The landscape which Socrates describes to Simias 
(PhsBton,) possesses infinitely more beauty than the Para- 
dise of Eden : and the fable of the Hermaphrodites! is be- 

* Confessions, 1. VII. c. ix. v. :28. • 

t See the discourse of Aristophanes, in ttie "Banquet of Plato." 



65 

yond comparison a better invention than that which we read 
of in Genesis, where we are told that one of Adam's ribs 
was taken from him for the purpose of creating a female 
out of it. 

Can any more plausible account of the overthrow of So- 
dom and Gomorrah be given, than that it was caused by 
Phaeton ? Is there no resemblance between the fall of 
Lucifer and that of Vulcan, or of the giants struck down by 
the thunderbolts of Jove. How close the resemblance be- 
tween Sampson and Hercules ; Elijah and Phaeton ; Joseph 
and Hypolitus ; Nebuchadnezzar and Lycaon ; Tantalus 
and the rich man in torment ;* the manna in the wilderness 
and the ambrosia of the gods ! St,Augustine,t St. Cyril, and 
Theophilactus, compare Jonah with Hercules, called Tri- 
noctius, because he had been three days and three nights in 
the belly of a whale. 

The river which Daniel speaks of in chap, vii, v. 10, of 
his Prophecies, is palpably drawn from that Pyriphlegethon 
to which Plato alludes in his dialogue on the immortality of 
the soul. The idea of " Original Sin" is taken from the 
account of Pandora's box ; and the interrupted sacrifices of 
Isaac and of Jephtha's daughter are borrowed from that Ip- 
higenia, in whose room a hind was offered up. What we 
read of concerning Lot and his wife, is nearly the same as 
that which fabulous history informs us occurred to Baucis 
and Philemon. The histories of Perseus and of Bellerophon 
are the foundation of Michael and the demon whom he van- 
quished. In short, it is abundantly manifest tTiat the authors 
of the Scriptures have copied the works of Hesiod, Homer, 
and some other ancieat writers, almost word for word. 

With respect io Jesus Christ himself, Celsus, by appeal- 
ing to his opponent Origen, shows that he had taken some 
of his most approved apothegms from Plato — Such as this : 
" It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, 

' * Luke's Gospel, chap. xvi. v. 24. 

t *' The City of God/' book I. chap. xiv. 
f6. 



u6f 

than a rich maa ta enter into the kinacIon\ of God.'^* Il 
was owing to the sect of the Pharisees, to which he be- 
longed, that his followers believed in the immortality of the 
soul, the resurrection, and the torments of hell ; and also 
in the greater part of his morality,! the whole of which I 
find in Epictetus, Epicures, and a few others. This last 
mentioned philosopher was referred to by St. Jerome, as a 
man whose virtues ought to< put the best Christians to the 
blush ; and whose mode of life was so temperate that a mor- 
sel of cheese, with bread and water constitued his highest re-. 
past. Leading, a life so frugal, this philosopher, heathen as 
he was, declared that it was far better to be unfortunate 
and gifted with reason, than to be rich and opulent without 
it ; adding, that wealth and wisdom were rarely fond 
united in the sanve individual, and that it was impossible 
to enjoy happiness or contentment unless our conduct were 
guided by prudence, justice and honesty, which are the 
qualities whence flow all true and lasting enjoyments. 

As to Epictetus, I do not believe that there ever existed 
a man, not even excepting Jesus Christ, more firm, more 
self-denying, more equable, or who at any time gave forth 
to the world a n^ore sublime system of morality. Were it 
not that I should exceed the limits which I have prescribed 
to myself in this treatise, I could recount many beautiful 

* Orig. adv. Cels, I. VIII. chap. iv. Compare with Matthew, chap.. 
XIX. v. 24. 

t Op. adv. Jorin. 1. II. ehap, viii. — ''In indication of their refusal 
to take an oath, the Society of Friends quote the words of Christ? 
"Swear not at all;" unaware, or overlooking, that this expression is 
descriptive of a state of social perfection, when the word of a man will 
be as good as his oath. Many others of Christ's precepts besides thia 
are unobserved by Christians, such as ' Lay not up for yourselves 
treasures on earth,' 'Give to every one thatasketh, and from him that 
would borrow of you turn not thou away.' The morality of Christ is 
a beau ideal so far from being realized, that there is net even a similitude 
of it in the Christian icorld. The Quakers who vauntingly obey this 
precept regarding oaths, has no hesitation in breaking the other pre- 
cepts respecting ihe hoarding of money^ and refusing to give it away." 
*^ Translator's Note. 



67 

traits in his cliaracter ; but the reader must be contented 
with one example. When a slave to Epaphroditiis, a cap*^ 
tain of Nero's guards, his master took the brutal fancy to. 
writhe his limhs^ Epictetus, perceiving that it gave the 
monster satisfaction, said with a smile, that he saw clearly 
that the joke would not end until he had broken one of 
them, which happened accordingly. The philosopher with 
the same equanimity and the same smile,^ merely said, 
" Did 1 not tell you that you would certainly break the 
limb ?" Where is there on record another instance of like 
firmness ? How would Je&us Christ have acted in the 
circumstances ?— he who wept and trembled at the least 
alarm, and who in his last moments exhibited a pusillani- 
mity altogether contemptible, and which was never shown 
by the martyrs f(»r his faith. 

If the work which Arian wrote concerning the life and 
death of our philosopher had been preserved, I have no doubt 
that we would have been in possession of many more ex- 
amples of his equanimity than we have at present. I know 
that the priests will speak of the example which I have 
instanced, as they speak of the virtues of philosophic minds 
in general, and assert that it is based on vanity, and that 
it is by no means what it appears to be ; but I know also, 
that those people are accustomed to speak ex cathedra what- 
ever suits their purpose and to think they sufficiently earn 
the money which is given them for instructing the people, 
by declaiming against every man who knows what sober 
reason and real virtue are. Noihing in the world can be 
less in congruity with the actions of these superstitious men 
who decry them, than the manner of the truly learned. 
The former, having studied for no other end than to obtain a 
place to give them bread, become vain, and congratulate 
themselves when they have obtained it, as if they had 
arrived at the state of perfection ; whereas it is nothing else 
to them than a state of idleness, pride, voluptuousness, and 
licentiousness, — a condition in which the great majority of 
them hold in no respect whatever the maxims of thatreligioa 
which they profess. But we will leave these men, who, 
have not the remotest conception of real virtue, and examiae 
\he evidences for the divinity of their master. 



68 



^ 19. 

Having considered the politics and the nnorality of Jesus 
Christ, wherein we find nothing so useful or so sublime as 
tp-e jfind in the writings of the ancieiits, let us now^ consider 
ii^ the reputation which he acquired after his death be a 
proof of his divinity. 

The generality of mankind are so much accustomed to 
what is irrational, that it is astonishing to find people en- 
deavouring to draw a rational inference from their conduct. 
Experience teaches us that they are always running after 
shadows, and that they neither do nor say anything betoken- 
ing common sense. These fanatical notions on which they 
found their belief will always be in vogue, in spite of the 
efforts of the learned who have invariably set themselves 
against them. So rooted are their follies that they had 
rather be crammed with them to repletion than, make any 
effort to be rid of them. 

It was to no purpose that Moses boasted that he was. 
the interpreter of God, and attemped to prove his mission 
and his authority by extraordinary signs. If he absented 
himself for a short time (as he did occasionally, to hold con- 
ference with the Divinity, by his account, and as in like 
manner did Numa Pompilius and many other legislators), it 
was only to find on his return strong traces of the worship 
of the gods whom the Hebrew people had seen in Egypt. It 
was in vain that he had led them for forty years through 
the desert, that they might lose recollection of the divinites 
which they had left behind. They had not forgot them, 
and they always wished for some visible symbol to pre- 
cede them, which, if they had got, they would have 
worshipped obstinately, at the risk of being exposed to e:>. 
treme cruelty. 

The pride-inspired contempt alone which led them to the 
hatred of other nations, made them insensibly forget the 
gods of Egypt, and attach themselves to that of Moses. 
They worshipped him for some time with all the outward 
observance of the law ; but with that inconstancy w^hich 
leads the vulgar to run after novelty, they deserted him at^ 
last to follow the God of Jesus Christo 



69 

§ 20. 

The most ignorant alone of the Hebrews followed Moses 
— such also were tliey who ran after Jesus Christ ; and their 
name being legion, and as they nuitually supported each 
other, it is not lo be wondered at if this new system of error 
was widely circulated. 'I'hf^ leaching of these novelties was 
not without danger to those who undertook the task, but the 
enthusiasm which they excited extiniiuished every fear. 
Thus, the disciples of Christ, miserable as they were in 
his train, and even dyirig of hunger — (as we learn from the 
necessity under which they were, together with their leader, 
of plucking the ears of corn in the fields to sustain their 
lives)— these flisciples never despaired till they saw their 
master in the hands of his executioners, and totally incapa- 
blie of gifting ihem u iih that wealth, and | ower, and grandeur, 
which he had led them to expect. 

After his death, his disciples being frustrated in their 
fondest hopes, made a virtue of necessity. Banished as 
they were from every place, and |)ersecuted by the Jews, 
who were eager to treat them as they had treated their 
master, they wandered into the neighboring countries ; in 
which, on the evidence of some women, they set forth the 
resurrection of Christ, his divinity, and the other fables 
wherewith the gospels are filled. 

It was their want of success among the Jewish people 
which led to the resolution of seeking their fortune among 
the Gentiles ; but as a little more kru)wledge than they pos- 
sessed was necessary for the accomplishment of their de- 
sign — the Geniiles beinir philosophically trained, and con- 
sequently mo much the friends of truth and reason to be 
duped by trifles — the sectaries of Jesus gained over to their 
cause a young man" of ardent temperament and active ha- 
bits, somewhat better instructed ihan the illiterate fishermen 
of Galilee, and more capable of drawing audiences to listen 
lo his talk. He being warned from heaven (miraculously 
of course), leagued himselt" with them, and drew over some 
partizans by the threat oi "fabled hell," (a plagiarism from 
the ancient poets), and by the hope of the joys of paradisGj^ 

* St. Paul,. 



70 

into which blessed abode he was impudent enough to assert' 
that, he had at one time been introduced. 

These disciples then, by strength of delusion and lying, 
procured for their master the honor of passing for a god^ — 
an honor at which, in his life-time, Jesus could never have 
arrived. His destiny was no better than that of Homer, 
nor even so good ; inasmuch as seven cities which had de- 
spised and starved the latter in his lifetime, struggled and 
fought with each other, in order to ascertain to which was 
due the merit of having given him birth. 

§ 21. 

It may be judged now, from what has been advanced, 
that Christianity, like every other religion, is only a com- 
plicated imposture — the success and progress of which 
would astonish the inventors themselves, could they revisit 
this world. Without bewildering ourselves, however, in a 
labyrinth of error and contradiction, such as we have al- 
luded to, we go to Mahomet, who founded his law on max- 
ims entirely opposite to those of Jesus Christ. 

§ 22. 

MAHOMET. 

Scarcely had the disciples of Jesus Christ torn down the 
Mosaic fabric for the purpose of establishing Christianity, 
\y.hen men, led by force of circumstances, and influenced by 
their usual inconstancy, followed the new legislator, who 
had elevated himself by means similar, as far as possible, to 
those which Moses employed. Like the Jewish lawgiver, 
Christ usurped the title of prophet, and ambassador of God ; 
like him he pretended to perform miracles, and took advan- 
tage of the passions of the multitude. He soon found him- 
self escorted by an ignorant populace, to whom he explained 
the new oracles of heaven. These miserably misled peo- 
ple, from the promises and fables of this new impostor, 
spread his renown far and wide, as having eclipsed all his 
predecessors. 

Mahomet, on the contrary, was a man who did not appear 
at all competent to lay the foundation of an empire. He was 
distinguished neither as a politician nor a philosopher : he 



71 

could neither read nor write.* At first he exhibited so lit* 
tie firmness, ihat he was frequently upon the point of aban- 
doning his enterprise ; and he would have done so, had it 
not been for the address of onejifhis followers. When he 
was rising into celebrity, Corais, a powerful Arab chief, 
being irritated that a. man of yesterday should have the 
boldness to mislead the people, declared himself his enemy, 
and attempted to thwart his designs ; but the people, be^ 
lieving that Mahomet had continued intercourse with God 
and his angels, supported him till he had an opportunity of 
being avenged upon his adversary. The tribe of Corais 
was worsted ; and Mahomet seeing himself surrounded by 
a host of fanatics, thought that he stood in no need of a 
coadjutor. However, lest Corais should expose his im* 
postures, he took the initiative ; and to mftke sure, he load- 
ed him with promises, and swore that he only wished to 
become great in order to share with him that power, to the 
establishment of which he might so much contribute. "We 
can agree," said he, " when we reach our proper elevation ; 
we can depend, in the meantime, on that great multitude 
whom we have gained over, and it only remains that we 
make sure of them by the employment of that artifice which 
you have so happily invented." At the same time he per- 
suaded him to descend into the Cave of Oracles. 

* I can believe," observes the Count de Boulainvilliers, "that Ma- 
homet was ignorant of the common elements of education. But assured- 
ly he was not ignorant in respect to that vast knowledge which a far 
travelled man of great natural powers may acquire. He was not igno- 
rant of his native tongue, although he could not read it, being master of 
all its subtleness and all its beauties. He was thoroughly qualified to 
render hateful whatever was truly blameworthy, and to paint truth in 
colours so simple and vivid, that it was impossible to misunderstand it. 
All that he has said is true, as regards the essential dogmas of Religion • 
but Ac lias not said all that is true, and in this respect alone does our re- 
ligion differ from his." Farther on he adds, that " Mahomet was nei- 
ther ignorant nor a barbarian ; he conducted his enterprise with all 
the skill, delicacy, perseverance, and intrepidity, which was necessary 
to ensure its success. His views were as lofty as any which Alexander 
the Great, or Julius Caesar, were capable of entertaining, had they been 
In his position." — Life of Mahomet by Count de Boulainvilliers, book 11. 
pp. 266-8, Araslerdam edit. 1731. 



72 

This was a dried-np sunk well, from the bottom of which 
Corais spoke, in order that the people might believe that it 
was the voice of God declaring himself in favour of Mahomet 
who was in the midst of his proselytes. Deceived by the 
blandishments of the leader, his associate regidarly descen- 
ded into the well, to counterfeit the oracle. Whilst Mahom- 
et was passing one day at the head of an infatuated multi- 
tude, they heard a voice, which said — " I am your God, and 
n/ I declare that Mahomet is the prophet whom I have appoint- 
^* ^ ed for all nations ; he will instruct you in my law of truth, 
which the Jews and Christians have altered." For a long 
time the accomplice played this game ; but at last he met 
with the blackest ingratitude. The voice being heard, as 
usual, proclaiming him an inspired personage, Mahomet turn- 
ed to the people, and commanded them, in the name of that 
God who had recognised him as his prophet, to fill up the 
well with stones, that it might be an enduring witness in 
his favour, like that pillar which Jacob set up to mark the 
place where God had appeared to him.* Thus perished, 
miserably, the chief who had most contributed to the eleva- 
tion of Mahomet. It was upon this heap of stones that the 
last of the three most celebrated impostors established his 
religion, and so solid and stable is its foundation, that after 
the lapse of twelve hundred years there is little appearance 
at present of its being overthrown. 

§ 23. 

In this way was the power of Mahomet established ; and 
he was more fortunate than Jesus, inasmuch as he lived to 
see the wide diffusion of his doctrii\es, which Christ on ac- 
count of his want of resources, was unable to do. He was 
even more fortunate in this respect than Moses, who from 
excess of ambition brought himself to a premature end. — 
Mahomet died in peace, and loaded with blessings. He 
had, moreover, a well-grounded hope that his religion would 
last, because it was accommodated to the nature of a people 
born and brought up in ignorance ; an adaptation in which 
men more learned than himself, but less accustomed to as- 
sociate with the lower orders, might have entirely failed^ 

* Genesis chap, xxviii. v. 18. 



n 

The reader is now in possession of the most remarkable 
facts concerning the three most celebrated legislators, whose 
religions have brought into subje<:tion a great part of the 
human race. They were such as we have represented 
them ; and it is for you to consider if they are worthy of 
your respect, and if you are jusiified in allowing yourselves 
to be led by those whom ambition alone conducted to pow- 
er, and whose dreams have been perpetuated by ignorance. 
The following observations, if read with a free and unpre- 
judiced mind, may lead to the discovery of truth, by c I earr- 
ing away those mists wherewith you have been blinded and 
beguiled. 



CHAPTER IV. 

TRUTHS EVIDENT AND OBVIOUS TO THE SENSES. 

§ 1. 

Moses, Jesus Christ, and Mahomet, being; sjjch as we 
have represented them, it is evident that it would be useless 
to search in their writirigs for a new idea of the Divinity. 
The conferences of Moses and Mahomet with the Deity, 
and the miraculous conception of Jesus Christ, are the 
greatest impostures that have ever met the face of day, 
and you must shun their contem})Iation as you lov-e the 
truth. 

God, as we have seen, being only Nature, or in other 
words the combination of all beings, all properties, and all 
energies, is necessarily the cause (rom which emanates every 
thing, and of course not disiinct or different from its efTecis. 
He carmot be termed good, nor evil, nor just, nor merciful 
nor jealous : these attributes belong ordy to mankind. The 
Deity therefore can neither punish nor reward. The oppo- 
site idea may lead aside the ignorarit, who, conceiving the 
Divinity to be an uncom[)ounde(l essence, represent him to 
themselves under images altogether unsuited to his natiire. 
Those alone who exercise their judgment without confound- 

7 

9 



74 • 

ing its operations with those of their imaginative faculty, and 
who have sufficient strength of mind to cast away the pre- 
judices of infancy, can form a clear and distinct conception 
of the subject. They regard him as the author of every 
being, producing ihem without distinction, and giving no 
preference to one over another, and whose power is such 
that he created man with as much ease as he did the meanest 
worm, or the humblest plant. 

We must therefore believe that this universal Being whom 
we generally name God, takes no greater care of a man 
than of an ant, nor pays more altention to a lion than to a 
stone ; neither regards the beauty or deformity, good or evil 
perfection or imperfection. He cares not to be praised, be- 
seeched, sought aiter, or flattered ; he is not affected by 
what men say or do ; he is not susceptible of love or hatred:* 
in one word he is not more occupied with man than he is 
with the rest of the other creatures, whatever may be their 
nature. All these distinctions are merely the inventions of 
a limited understanding : they originate in ignorance, and 
self-interest keeps them up. 

M- 

Thus, therefore, no rational man can believe in God, nor 
in hell, nor in spirits, nor in devils, in the sense in which 
the terms are generally understood. These big words have 
only been coined to intimidate and blind the vulgar. Those 
who wish to convince themselves of this truth would do 
well to devote particular attention to what follows, and ac- 
custom themselves to suspend their judgment until after 
mature reflection. 

* Omnis enim per se divum natura necesse est 
Iinmortali aevo snmiiiacnrn pace frUHliir, 
Setnota ab nostris rebus, sejunctaqne lorige ; 
Nam privata dolore onini, privala periclis 
Ipsa uis pollens opil)iis: nihil iiidiga ndstri, 
Nee bene pro nieriiis capitnr, nee tanuitnr ira. 

Lucretius dc Rtrum Nat. Book I. v, 57, andfolloicing. 



75 ■ 

^5. 

The infinity of stars which we see above us has not es- 
caped the fictions of presumptive credulity. Amongst the 
ghttering hosts, there is one said to have Ijeen set apart for 
the celestial court, where God holds regal state in the midst 
of his courtiers. This place is the residence of the bles- 
sed, wither the souls of the virtuous are conveyed after 
leaving the body. We need not dwell upon an opinion so 
frivolous and so contradictory to common sense. It is well 
eru)ugh ascertained that what we denominate the heavens 
is merely a continuation of the air which surrounds us — a 
fluid through which the other planets move, like the earth 
which we inhabit, unsustained and unconnected with any 
solid mass whatever. 

§ 6. 

The priests having, like the pagans with their Gods and 
goddesses, invented a heuoen, where God and the blessed 
might dwell ; after the same example next they contrived a 
hdl^ or subterranean place, to which, they assure us, the 
spirits of wicked men g^ down for the purpose of being 

cvei lastingly tormented. Now, the word /re/7, in its origi- 
nal sense, imports no more than a place dark and deep ; and 
the potits invented it as thf^ opposite to the residence of the 
blessed, which they represented as high and bright. This 
is the exact signirtcation of the Latin terms inferus and m- 
feri, and the Greek hades ; any dark place such as a sepul- 
chre, or whatever was fearful Irom its depth and obscurity. 
The whole sprung from the imagination of the poet and the 
knavery of the priests — the former knowing how to make 
an impression in this way, on weak, timid, and melancholy 
minds ; and the latter havirjg rather more substantial reasons 
for continuing the delusion. 



Chap. V.— ON THE SOUL. 
§ 1. 

This is rather a more delicate subject to handle than the 
last which we had occasion to treat of, viz : Heaven and 



76 

Hell. For the reader's sake, therefore, it must be treated 
at greater length ; but before clefiiiing it, an exposilioii of 
the opiuioDS of the most celebraied philosophers is nec- 
essary, which will be given in a few words, in order that 
the reader may be the better enabled to carry it along with 
him. 

Their opinions are exceedirjgly varied. Some have pre^ 
tended that the soul is a spirit or immaterial essence 
others have maintained that it is a part of the Divinity 
others assert that it is the concord oi' all parts of the body 
and some uphold that it is the UKJSt subtle pan of the bhjod, 
separated into the brain, and thence distributed through tlie 
nervous system. If this is established, the soul must take 
its origin from the heart which creates it ; and the place 
where it exercises its noblest functions must be the brain ^ 
as ttiat organ is the most purified fniui the grosser parts of 
the blood. 

Such are a few of the different opinions which have been 
given to the world in regard to the souh The belter to 
develope them, we shall divide them into two classes. In 

the one will be found the stalemejUs of tliose philt)6<>phcra 

who considered the soul as material ; and in the other those 
of the opposite party, w^ho maintained the doctriue of its 
immateriality^ 

§3. 

Pythagoras and Plato have both maintained the doctrine 
that the soul was immaterial in its nature ; that is, a being 
existing without aid from the body, and capable of action 
uncontrolled by any thing corporeal. They hold that all 
the individual spirits of animals were emanations from the 
universal Soul of the World, and that these off-givings were 
incorporeal, immortal, and of the same nature as the per- 
vading Essence itself. They illustrated their doctrine 
well, by the analogy of a thousand little lights which are 
all of the same nature as the great flame at which they were 
kindled. 

§ 4. • 

These philosophers believed that the universe was ani- 



77 

mated by an immaterial Essence, immortal and invisible, 
knowing everything, and acting always ; and which is the 
cause of every movement, and the origin of all spirits, 
these being merely emanations from it. Then, as spirits 
are very subtle, they cannot unite (they observe) unless they 
can ^nd a body subtle as the light, or as that expanded air 
which the vulgar take for heaven. They therefore assume 
a body less subtle, then another somewhat gross ; and thus 
by degrees they come to be enabled to unite themselves to 
the bodies of animals, into which they descend as into 
dungeons or sepulchres. The death of the body, accord- 
ing to th.em, is the life of the soul, which was in a manner 
buried, and could ordy in a feeble way exercise its noblest 
functions. At the death of the body, the soul shakes off 
materiality, comes forth of its prison-house, and unites it- 
self to the Soul of the World from which it emanated. 

According to this opinion then, all the spirits of animals 
are of the same nature ; and the diversity of their functions 
and faculties arises solely from the difference of the bodies 
into which they descend. 

Aristotle supposes an universal intelligence, acting on 
particular intelligences, as light acts upon the eye ; and 
that as light renders objects visible, so. does this universal 
intelligence render the others inleHigent. 

This philosopher defines the soul- as that whereby we 
live, feel, think, and move ; but he is unsatisfactory as to 
the nature of that Being which is the source of its noblest 
functions. It is needless, therefore, to search in his writ- 
ings for a solution of the difficulties which exist upon this 
subject. 

Dicearchus, Asclepiad^s, and GaHenus, have also, to a 
certain extent, believed that the soul was immaterial, but in 
a different way from that already aRuded to. They suppose 
that the soul is nothing else than the harmony of all the 
parts of the body : that is, the result of an exact blending 
of its elements and disposition of its parts, its humours, 
and its essences. Thus, they say, as health is not a part 
of tliat which is healthy, although it is connected with i(? 
so neither is the soul a part of the animal, although it be 
within it, but simply the harmony of all those parts which 
go to form the containing body. 

7s 



IB 

On these opinions we must remark, that their defenders 
believe in the immateriality of the soul on self-contradictory 
principles ; for to maintain ihai the soid is not a body, but 
merely something inseparably attached to a body, is to say 
that it is corporeal. We not ordy term that corporeal which 
is a body, but everything which has form and accident, and 
which cannot bo separated from matter. 

Such are the opinions of those philosophers who main- 
tain that the soul is incorporeal or immaterial. We see 
that they are discordant and contradictory to each other, 
and consequently little to be heeded as points of faith. 
We now come to the opposite party, who have upheld the 
doctrine of its materiality. 

Diogenes believed that the soul was composed of air, 
whence he deduces the necessity of respiration. He de- 
fines it as an air which passes through the mouth into the 
pulmonary vessels, whence it becomes warm, and whence 
it is distributed to every part of the system. 

Leucippus and Democritus assert that it is fire, and that, 
like fire, it is composed of atoms which readily penetrate 
all parts of the body, and communicate motion to it. 

Hippocrates said that it was composed of water and of 
fire. Empedocles thought that it was compounded of the 
four elements. Epicurus believed with Democritus that 
the soul is composed of fire, but he adds that there enter 
into its composition, air, a vapour, and an indescribable sub- 
stance, which is the principle of thought. Out of these 
four different substances he makes to himself a very subtle 
spirit, pervading all the body, and which, he says, we ought 
to term the soul. 

Descartes reasons also, but in a very wretched manner, 
that the soul is not material. I say in a very wretched 
manner, for never did philosopher reason so badly on this 
subject as did this great man. Here is his argument. He 
sets out by saying that he must doubt in the existence of 
iiis own body, believing that there exists no such thing as 
a body at all, and then he reasons in this fashion : *' There 
exists no body ; I exist nevertheless : I am iherefoie not a 
body, and consequently I can only be a substance which 



79 

thinks." Although this fine reasoning destroys itself sufS- 
ciently, I will yet lake the liberty of giving my opinion of 
it in two words. 

1. The doubt which M. Descartes assumes is indefensi- 
ble ; for although one may sometimes think that he does 
not think that be has a body, it is true nevertheless that he 
has a body, since he thinks of it. 

2. Whoever believes that there exists no body, ought to 
be well assured that he is not one himself; for no one can 
doubt in his own existence. If he is assured in this mat- 
ter, his doubt is useless. 

3. When he says that the soul is a substance which 
thinks, he tells us nothing new. Every person agrees in 
this ; but the difficulty is to ascertain the 7iature of that 
substance which thinks, and in this respect M. Descartes 
is no wiser than his predecessors. 

k 6. 

That we may not go crooked as he has done, and that 
we may form the soundest conception possible of the soul 
of all animals, without excepting man, who is of the same 
nature, and who only exercises different functions from the 
difference in his organization, it is important to attend to 
the following remarks. 

It is certain that there exists in the universe a very 
subtle fluid, a substance extremely attenuated, whose 
source is the sun, and which prevades all other bodies, less 
or more, according to their nature and their consistence.. 
Such is the soul of the world, which governs and vivifies 
it, and of which some portion is distributed to all the crea- 
tures in the universe.* 

This soul is the purest fire. It burns not of itself, but 
by different movements, which it communicates to the par- 
ticles of other bodies into which it enters, it burns and 
makest its warmth be felt. Our visible fire contains more of 
this matter than air ; air, more than water ; and earth, con- 
siderably less than any of them. Plants have more of it than 
minerals, and animals more than either. In fine, this fire 

* If a work be translated, it always receives a colouring, which ia 
more or less faint or vivid according to the opinions and ability of the 
Translator. — Volney's Lectures on History 



80 

pervading the body renders it capable oftlionght, and is that 
properly termed the soul, although it sometimes receives the 
appellation of animal spirits, which permeate the whole 
body. It is certain therefore that this soul being of the 
same nature as that of animals, is annihilated at the death 
of man, as it is at that of the other creatures. It follows 
that whatever poets and divines have told us of a future 
state, is only the chimerical offspring of their own brain, be- 
gotten and nourished by them for purposes which is by 
no means- difficult to fathom. 



ON THE SPIRITS CALLED DEMONS. 
§ I. 

We have explained in another place how the notion of 
spirits came to be introduced among men, and proved that 
they were merely phantoms which existed only in their 
disordered imagination. 

The first instructors of mankind w^ere not very explicit in 
their " lessons to the million" as to the nature of these 
phantoms, but they could not help saying what they thought 
of them. One class, reflecting that these shadows melted 
into thin air and had no consistence, described them as im- 
material or incorporeal, having shapes without matter, but 
coloured and defined. At the same time however, they 
denied that they were corporeal existences, or that they 
were coloured or figured ; adding that they could clothe 
themselves with air as with a garment, when they wished 
to become visible to the eye of men. A second class 
assert that they were animated bodies, but that they were 
composed of air, or some still more subtle matter, which 
they could thicken at their pleasure, when they chose to 
make their appearance. 

§2. 

If the two sorts of philosophers were opposed to each 
other in their opinion as to those shadows, they agreed as 
to their name, viz., Demons ; in which respect they were 
as those who, when dreaming, believe that they see the 
souls of people departed^ and that it is their own soul which 



81 

they behold when they look into a mirror — or, in shorty 
those who can belieA^e that the reflections of the stars 
which they see in the water are the souls of the stars them- 
selves. Out of this truly ridiculous belief they wandered 
into an erra no less absurd ; believing thnt these phantoms 
possessed unlimited power — an idea sufficiently devoid of 
reason, but current among the ignorant, who suppose that 
these beings, whom they know not, can exert a fearful 
influence. 

^ 3. 

This most absurd creed was invented and promulgated by 
legislators, iri order to support their own authority. They 
established this belief in spirits under the name of religion, 
hoping that the dread of these invisible powers which the 
people would entertain, might keep them to their diity. 
To give the more weight to their dogma, they classified 
those spirits or demons as good and had ; the one species 
being intended to stimulate men to the observance of their 
laws, and the other to act as a check and prevent their 
breaking them. 

To ascp.rtain what these demons really were, it is only 
necessary to read the works of the Greek poets arid his- 
torians, and above all, the Theogany of Hesiod, where he 
dwells ill great lengLli un ilie origin of ihe gods. 

§4. 
The Greeks invented them. From that people they 
passed by means of their colonies into Asia, Egypt, and 
Italy. In ihis way the Jews, who were dispersed in Alex- 
andria and elsewhere became acquainted with them. They 
made the same happy use of them as other nations did — • 
with this difference, that, unlike the Greeks, they did not 
call them demons, or regard them as good and bad spirits 
indifferently. They considered them all as bad with one 
single exception, to whom they gave the name of the Spirit, 
or God ; and they termed those men prophets who said 
that they were inspired by the good Spirit. Farther, they 
viewed as the operations of this divine Spirit whatever they 
considered as a great blessing; and on the other hand, they 
looked upon whatever they thought to be a great evil, as 
proceeding from some cacodemon or evil spirit. 



§5. 

This distinction between good and evil led them to the 
wsa of the appellation demoniacs, which they applied to 
lunatics, madmen, furious persons, and epileptics, as also 
to those who made use of *' the unknown tongues." A 
man deformed and somewhat deranged, was said to be 
possessed of an unclean spirit ; and a dumb man by a dumb 
spirit. These words, spirit and demon, became so familiar 
to them that they used them on every occasion. It foUows 
that the Jews believed with the Greeks, that these phan- 
toms were neither chimerical nor visionary, but real and 



substantial agents. 



§e. 



Hence it is that the Bible is filled with tales of spirita, 
and demons, and demoniacs ; but in noplace of that book is 
it said how and when they were created — an omission 
scarcely pardonable on the part of Moses, who undertakes 
to give an account of the creation both of the heavens and 
of the earth. Christ who speaks very frequently of angels 
and spirits, good tind bad, dot^s nol iiifuriii us wlietbur they 
are material or immaterial. This makes it evident that 
both of them were ignorant of the fact that the Greeks had 
instructed their ancestors in this strange belief. Were 
the case otherwise, Jesus Chirst would be no less culpable 
for his silence on the subject, than he is for his refusal to 
grant to the majority of the human race, that grace, that 
faith, and that piety, which he assures them it is in his 
power to bestow. 

But to return to the subject of Spirits. It is certain these 
words Demons, Satait, Devil, are only proper nances intend- 
ed to apply to any obnoxious individual of our own species ; 
and that, at no period did any but the most ignorant believe 
in their existence, either amongst the Greeks who invented^ 
or the Jews who adopted the terms. After the latter be- 
came infected with such notions, they applied these words 
which signify enemy, accuser^ and destroyer, at one time to 
invisible Powers, and at another, to those which are visible. 
Thus, they declared of the Gentiles, that their dwelling was 
in the kingdom of Satan ; there beiag none other thaa 



&3 

themselves (by tlieir own account of the matter) who dwelt 
in the kingdom of God. 

Jesus Christ being a Jew, and consequently imbued with 
these opinions, we need not be surprised when we meet in 
the gospels and the writing of bis disciples the words 
Devil, Satan, and Hell, as if they were anything real or 
substantive. We have showed before that there can be 
nothing more chimerical ; but although what was said might 
suihce to saiisfy rational men, we are not the less necessita- 
ted to add a tew words, in an attempt to convince the 
bigotted. 

All Christains agree that God is the source of everything ; 
that he created all things — that he sustains them, and that 
without his support they would drop into annihilation — 
From these principles, it is certain that he created that 
being whom they call the Devil, or Satan. Whether he 
were created good or evil is nothing to the argument ; he 
is incontestibly the work of the great Head, and if he 
continue to exist, all wicked as they represent him to be, 
it must only be at the good pleasure of God. Now, how 
is it possible to conceive that God would preserve one of 
his creatures, who not only hates him mortally, and blas- 
phemes him without end, but who sets himself to seduce 
the friends of the Almighty for the sole purpose of mortify- 
ing him. How is it possible, I repeat, that God can per- 
mit this Devil to exist, who turns aside from his worship 
the favored and the elect, and who would dethrone him 
were it in his power ? 

'J'his is what we wish to say in speaking of God, or 
rather in speaking of the Devil and Hell. If God is al- 
mighty, and if nothing can happen without his permission, 
how comes it that the devil bates him, blasphemes him, 
and seduces his worshippers ? The Deity either consents 
to this or he does not. If he consents to it, the Devii in 
blaspheming him is only doing his duty, since he can do 
nothing but what God wishes, and consequently it is not 
the Devil, but God himself who blasphemes himself, — a 
fearfully absurd supposition. If he does not consent to it 
he cannot be omnipotent, and there must be two principles, 



84 

the one of good, and the other of evil — the one aiming at one 
thing, and the other at its direct opposite. 

To what then leads our reasoning ? To this ; that neith- 
er God, nor the Devil, nor Paradise, nor Hell, nor ihe Soul> 
are such as religion has represented them to be, and as most 
revxrend divines have maintained. These latter sell their 
fables for truths, being people of bad faith who abuse the 
credulity of the ignorant by making them believe whatever 
they please ; as if the vulgar were absolutely unfitted to 
hear the truth and could be nourished by nothing but 
those absurdities, in which a rational mind can only dis- 
cover a vast of nothing, and a waste of folly. 

The world has been long infected with these most absurd 
opinions, yet in every age men have been found — truth-lov- 
ing men — who have striven against the absurdities of their 
day. This little treatise has been written from like motives, 
and in it the lovers of truth will doubtless meet with some 
things satisfactory. It is to them that I appeal, caring little 
for the opinion of those who substitute their own prejudices 
in place of infallible oracles. 

Happy the man, who, studying Nature's laws, 
Through known effects can trace the secret cause ; 
His mind possessing in a quiet state, 
Fearless of Fortune, and resigned to Fate. 

DryderCs Translation of Virgil, Georgics, Book II, I. 700. 



/X-*-****-^^ ^"^ 











THE 




THREE IMPOSTORS. 





TRANSLATED 



(WITH NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS,) 




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